


Temptation is the devil looking through the keyhole.

by adarkercolour



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Anal, Baseball, Blow Jobs, CANON TYPICAL TERRIBLE OPINIONS AND THOUGHTS AND THOUGHT PROCESSES, Drugs, Exhibitionism, Gay, M/M, Manipulation, Masturbation, Porn, Questionable "humour", Some heavy themes executed in a hopefully unheavy way, Strippers, Suicide mention, THE CATHOLICS, Voyeurism, Will add tags as I go, Work In Progress, bible burning, but im english so its ok, calling english people ugly, lindsay lohans plastic surgeon, mentions of sex workers, plus everyone hates the english so, shouting and lots of it, the royals - Freeform, underage but not bad just awkward
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-10-13
Packaged: 2019-11-26 13:47:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18181391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adarkercolour/pseuds/adarkercolour
Summary: Yielding is opening the door and letting him in.- Billy SundayMac enjoys being out a little too much. Dennis does not like.Dennis uses Catholic guilt. It is super effective.





	1. A Habit That Sticks

Ironically, after Mac comes out and, much to everyone’s surprise, stays out, he spends most of his time locked away in his bedroom with only Dennis’ laptop and the dildo bike for company.

Dennis has a theory that Mac’s trying to catch up on the twenty-five or so years of gay porn he missed out on by being repressed as fuck, and while he can’t blame the guy for wanting to make up for lost time, being best friends with a recluse is becoming a major league pain in Dennis’ ass for a number of reasons.

Number one, he never sees Mac any more, and Dennis is surprised by how lonely he gets without him glued to his side. There’s no-one to laugh at his hilarious jokes, no-one to impress with his stories of sexual conquest and derring-do. Every now and then Mac will emerge from his room, greeting Dennis with a big, showy stretch and a “Oh wow, I sure needed that nap!”; and Mac will hang out for a little while, but before even a half hour has passed he’ll be yawning exaggeratedly and saying, “Shit, I’m beat, I’m gonna go for a little lie-down I think, don’t worry about waking me…” and hurrying back to his bedroom, laptop under one arm. As if Dennis was born yesterday or something, and doesn’t know what he’s really doing in there. Dennis sometimes begins to ask Mac not to go, to stay and watch a movie or play chequers; but his pride won’t let him, and the words catch in his throat like his meds do, acid in his chest and fire in his gullet.

Even at the bar, work being the only reason Mac leaves the apartment nowadays, he’ll squirrel himself away in the back office, or Charlie’s Bad Room, or the keg store, or on one notable occasion, the cellar. The health inspector was due, so Charlie had been doing his usual routine of letting the carbon monoxide levels build up in order to get rid of the rats. Mac had either forgotten that he’d been warned about it, or hadn’t listened in the first place, or decided it was worth the risk anyway, and gone down there for some “alone time”. It was a good job that Dennis had found him when he had, passed out with his hand in his pants and a copy of Men’s Health on the floor next to him. God alone knows how long he’d been down there.

When Mac finally came to (which was a relief because Dennis’ palm was starting to sting from slapping him round the face) he’d sworn blind he couldn’t even remember why he’d been in the cellar to begin with, and Dennis couldn’t tell if he was lying, or if it was genuine amnesia from carbon monoxide poisoning. But, there seemed to be no real lasting effects, other than Mac seemingly having forgotten how to spell “tequila”, something they hadn’t discovered until he’d put up a post on the pub’s Facebook page about “2-4-1 shots tokiller” and someone flagged it as ‘inappropriate’, citing that it appeared to be a coded advert for a hitman.

 

-.-.-

 

The second reason Dennis hates Mac’s new-found onanistic obsession is that Mac seems to forget he shares the apartment – an apartment with _paper thin walls_ – with another person, and doesn’t appreciate that said person, when getting home after a long shift, perhaps doesn’t want to hear their roommate going gangbusters on a home-made sex-contraption.

The first time it occurred (or at least the first time it had occurred so goddamn loudly - Mac was already harboring a pretty bad addiction to having "alone time"), Dennis assumed Mac had hooked up with someone on Grindr and was getting fucked within an inch of his life. Dennis was in a foul mood already, returning to the apartment early after striking out with a hot blonde he’d been pursuing for some time. He’d tried Mac’s door despite the noises coming from behind it - Dennis’ modus operandi now _he_ wasn’t getting laid was to make things as awkward as possible for anyone in the vicinity who _was_ getting laid. What was more discomfiting than having the object of your unrequited affections burst in to find you whimpering like a little bitch while getting plowed stupid by some random guy? Plus, he didn’t want a constant stream of beefcakes in and out of the apartment, and this kind of stuff got around The Gays fast.

(The conversations, Dennis imagined, would go something like -

Gay guy number one: _“You seen that new twunk on the apps?”_

Gay guy number two: _“Oh yeah, I totally hit that. He’s, like, majorly obsessed with his_ much _better-looking roommate though. Couldn’t stop talking about him the whole time we were together. Called me Dennis while we were banging, and then the guy himself interrupted us right in the middle of it... His roommate’s so much hotter as well. It really put me off my stride.”_

Gay guy number one: _“Ooh nasty. Shame his roommate’s not on the apps though.”_

Gay guy number two: _“Honestly? He’s too good for dating sites. The man is a god.”_ )  

Much to Dennis’ chagrin, the door had stayed steadfastly shut and locked, despite his best efforts. The attempted entry didn’t even slow them down by the sound of it, so Dennis had positioned himself strategically in the chair facing Mac’s bedroom. There would be no escape from his smug judgement for Mac and his “friend” when they finally decided to surface.

Dennis settled himself down to wait them out with a cup of coffee and a copy of the ‘Inquirer’, but he couldn’t focus for picturing Mac and some guy going at it in every position imaginable.  He tried to distract himself, but it was difficult. After sharing living quarters with Mac for years, he thought he’d heard every noise the man could make, but this was different. He sounded torn apart, his voice ragged and breathing laboured, every now and then giving out a whine or a groan, animalistic and raw. It was making Dennis feel even worse and causing a weird churning in his abdomen that he didn’t want to think about. He was seriously considering giving it up and going to bed with a bottle of vodka and some Vicodin, when Mac made a last strangled-sounding yelp and it all went silent.

Dennis had quickly composed himself, mug in hand and lips pursed with contempt, eyes narrowed disdainfully. The lock slid back with a ‘snick’, and then the door was open, and Mac was there, pants hanging obscenely low on his hips, a towel in his hand and dabbing at his bare stomach. He was whistling tunelessly. Dennis thought he recognised the melody, but he was more interested in what a loser desperate enough to bang a 40 year-old man with no real sexual experience looked like. He craned his neck, examining the room beyond Mac expectantly.

“Jesus fuck, Dennis!” Mac exclaimed, finally having noticed his friend sat at the table, looking strangely meerkat-esque as he tried to lay eyes on Mac’s companion. “You scared the shit out of me!” Mac had said, and Dennis watched the color suddenly drain from his face before he added, “Um. How—how long have you been there, bud?” It was gratifying to see him squirm, he was trying to appear blasé and failing miserably. His eyes wouldn’t meet Dennis’, and as much as Dennis usually hated that, on this particular occasion it left him feeling oddly satisfied.

Dennis was beginning to understand. Mac had been alone. Maybe fucking himself on the dildo bike? Or some other toy he’d bought or, god help him, made. Maybe he’d gone old school and just used his fingers.

Whatever he’d been doing, he’d enjoyed it, and that made Dennis angry. Angry that he _never_ felt that good. Angry that Mac was carving out his own little niche in the world, somewhere that Dennis didn’t fit. (Ok, it was a niche which involved lots of jacking-off and quite possibly a good degree of dildo-related action, but even so. Dennis liked to be included.) He was angry that Mac was starting this brand-new adventure in life, of sex and exploration, maybe even love, while Dennis was stale and stuck and hadn’t gotten laid in three months.

And he was scared. He was scared he was losing his touch. He was getting older, his looks were fading, he didn’t have the capital to get younger chicks, and chicks his age were so repulsive they may as well be dead. Mac was the only one who appreciated him properly, and right now Mac would rather spend time with his left hand and a gargantuan silicon fist/dick hybrid than with Dennis.

As much as he hated to admit it, he was scared he might be losing his best friend, too.

All that having been said though, when nobody followed Mac out of his room, Dennis felt relief wash over him like a tidal wave. _He hadn’t been replaced... yet._ He did, however, still need to do something about the constant masturbation, and passive-aggression was as good a place to start as any.

“How long have I been here?” Dennis repeated scornfully. “Let’s just say I’ve been here long enough, _bud_ ,” and Mac at least had the good taste to look mortified.

Mac opened and closed his mouth a few times, seemingly unable to form a sentence, and Dennis thought he looked like a guppy. A big, dumb, stupid, horny guppy.

“Good talk,” Dennis sneered, his chair making a screeching noise on the wood flooring as he stood, causing Mac to wince. Dennis had stalked off to his bedroom without another word, slamming the door behind him. ‘ _I’ll let him stew on that for a while_ ’ he’d thought, a small smile on his face for the first time in what felt like days.

 

-.-.-

 

The final, and perhaps most irritating, consequence of Mac’s journey to self-discovery was that Dennis’ evening plans were getting well and truly shafted by his main wingman’s refusal to do anything that didn’t end with him covered in his own bodily fluids.

Movie night was now a solo venture, Dennis having to turn the TV up to 28 to cover the rhythmic pounding and breathless expletives emanating from the adjacent room (the TV should only _ever_ be on 20, they’d agreed that when they moved in. It was the prime volume for superior acoustics without distorting the sound. 28 was a goddamn abomination.)

Card games were out: the ones for single players were shit, and there was no one else to play with – Charlie never got the rules, Dee got bored and distracted, and Frank always cheated. Even just hanging out with the rest of the gang without Mac felt wrong. The chemistry was all off and arguments always ended with Dee and Charlie teaming up, and Frank pulling a gun, and Dennis generally being rail-roaded by the three biggest morons in Philly.

As it stands, Dennis hasn’t been anywhere other than Paddy’s or the apartment for what feels like months. There was the date with the blonde at Guigino’s, but that had been a bust. He’s almost completely lost interest in pursuing women. What’s the point when he’s got no-one to tell about how quickly he managed to charm them into bed, or how many times they’d made him come? Mac had always listened, rapt, when he recounted his various erotic tales. No-one else gave a shit however, and not having an adoring audience was wearing down his self-esteem. He’d even briefly wondered if maybe Mac didn’t love him anymore, if he’d finally gotten tired of hanging around him like a love-sick puppy, but judging by his search history, that wasn’t the case. (Mac had a bad habit of forgetting to delete his Google searches, and Dennis had fired up the laptop to find he had spent the previous night looking for “roommate gay fuck”, then “roommate gay fuck brown hair blue eyes”, then “otter cub fuck” [Dennis can only imagine the results for that one], and then, in what must have been moronic desperation, “Dennis Reynolds lookalike oral anal”.)

Dennis was confident that Mac still carried a torch for him based on that evidence. It wasn’t shining as brightly as it once had, sure, but it was still there. If not the full-on fiery torch of true love it had been, then maybe a blinking flashlight of lust, the bulb flickering as the batteries wore down. Or, at the very least, a fleshlight. Home-made of course.

Mac had just… got lost in the dark without Dennis, and he needed a steer back to the warm glow of the Golden God. It was nothing a little mental warfare couldn’t solve, a bit of subtle manipulation from the master himself. Dennis was ready to fire the first shot. It was time to commence Operation Return of the Mac.


	2. And I'm Back To Run The Show.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Messages from God are usually, y’know,” Mac starts counting them off on his fingers: “Visions, sometimes a burning bush, angels, Jesus’ face on a piece of toast, the Blessed Virgin as a water stain… Not so much written notes for the most part, which is kind of stupid when you think about it, coz writing it down would make the messages easier for people to remember and everything…” Mac pauses, and Dennis can see the cogs whirring away in his head.

“Whatcha readin’ bro?” Dennis asks, knowing full well what the answer is. He seats himself at the kitchen table with Mac, attempting to slouch nonchalantly in one of the wood effect chairs, but finding it very unforgiving on the bones in his ass. He straightens up. Mac’s brow is furrowed in concentration as he studies the paper he’s holding, lips moving as he reads, and Dennis kicks him in the shin a little bit when he doesn’t reply.

“Huh? Oh. Erm, it’s one of those Catholic Church pamphlet things,” Mac says as he gestures towards Dennis with it across the formica table-top.  “Did you not leave it on here?”

“I don’t _think_ so…” Dennis strokes his chin thoughtfully, as if trying to recall whether or not he might have left religious propaganda lying around the apartment.  “Maybe it’s from…” he points towards the ceiling and cocks his head, “the man upstairs?”

Mac screws his face up. “What, that junkie who took a shit in the elevator?”

“No! I mean… _God_ ,” Dennis says. He feels moronic even suggesting it.

Mac frowns, but looks like he might be considering the idea. “Dude, I doubt it. I mean. Obviously it’s _possible_.”

Dennis resists the urge to point out that, no, obviously it’s _not_ possible.

“… But it’s unlikely I think. Messages from God are usually, y’know,” Mac starts counting them off on his fingers: “Visions, sometimes a burning bush, angels, Jesus’ face on a piece of toast, the Blessed Virgin as a water stain… Not so much written notes for the most part, which is kind of stupid when you think about it, coz writing it down would make the messages easier for people to remember and everything…” Mac pauses, and Dennis can see the cogs whirring away in his head.

“Weird. Wonder where it…” Mac trails off, looking around the apartment with narrow eyes, like he might spot the holy being who’d delivered the word of God to him on a piece of printer paper. Mac doesn’t even appear to question that they hadn’t sprung for a color copy.

Dennis would usually find Mac’s unshakable faith in what can only be described as the absurd grating, but if it means Mac is more likely to follow the guidance in the leaflet, then Dennis can overlook it on this occasion.

“Hmm” Dennis says, trying not to look too interested. He runs his index finger over a bit of the table where the plastic covering has come away in three chunks and the cheap wood shows beneath the cheery yellow. The edges are sharp and snag his skin, and the exposed pine forms a hollow-eyed demon with a toothless grimace, leering under the sunny laminate. “What’s it about?”

Mac meets Dennis’ inquiring stare and quickly looks away again, folding the pamphlet up hurriedly. “Nothing really, just giving stuff up for lent, penitence. The usual.”

“Is that all Mac, coz that sounds pretty boring and you seemed really into it,” Dennis says wearily. Always this charade of normalcy before the truth. Even if Dennis hadn’t written the damn thing himself, he could still read the all-caps block-font title of the handout from across the table as Mac fiddles nervously with it: ‘PORN? AGAIN?! TRY BEING BORN AGAIN, INSTEAD’.

“Well… you’ll think it’s stupid, but it’s about how God doesn’t like people doing sex stuff on their own? Y’know like jerking off? And how porn’s wrong and they’re both sins. And that if you don’t know that it’s a sin you’re ok and you won’t go to hell because you didn’t know, but if you do know and you carry on anyway then you will go to hell because you knew and didn’t stop, and now I know,” Mac blurts out, folding the paper into tinier and tinier pieces the whole time he's talking. He looks at Dennis and his eyes are wide. He’s clearly worried. Dennis almost feels bad.

“Really,” Dennis says. He knows all this, because he made the pamphlet. But that’s not to say it isn’t completely rooted in fact. Or at least what the Catholic Church considers a fact. “So what’s the problem?”

Mac fidgets in his chair. “Coz I’ve kind of… I was… There’s so much…” he stumbles over his words, unable to say it. He and Dennis share a lot, share everything really, they’ve even jerked off together before now; but this isn't the same. Maybe because of the sheer extent of his habit, or that most of the porn he watches stars lithe 30-somethings with pale skin and loose, milk-chocolate colored curls.

“It’s ok man, I think I know what you’re trying to say”, Dennis hums warmly, reaching across the table to pat Mac’s arm in a show of support. Mac offers a tiny smile in response.

“You’ve been jacking it so much I’m surprised you haven’t ripped your cock off to be honest,” he adds, his words jarring in contrast to the kindness in his voice. He nods sagely at Mac, who looks like he wants to die. “Sounds like you might need to stop ‘shaking hands with the unemployed’ for now buddy, if you catch my drift.”

Mac makes a noise which sounds like he concurs, and stares at the table, his hands finally still and the leaflet held tight in his palm. “It’s lent tomorrow, it’s a good time to start stopping. It’s for the best anyway, considering my eyesight and stuff,” he says quietly, and Dennis squeezes his arm.

“Atta boy, you can do it,” Dennis says encouragingly, and grins. “Say, how about we celebrate your new found chastity with some beers and a movie? We can watch _Predator_?” He raises his eyebrows invitingly.

Mac looks initially interested, but then grimaces.

“Hmm, yeah, maybe too many beefcakes for this early in the process,” Dennis says, reading Mac’s mind. “How about Borat?”

Mac smiles, grateful, and says “My wiiiife” rather pathetically, even for him.

“Great! You sit on the couch, and I’ll get us some brewskis, yeah?” Dennis instructs as he goes to the fridge.

Mac settles himself in the lounge as directed, leaflet forgotten in his pants pocket and legs stretched out on the coffee table. He sighs as Dennis potters about in the kitchen, opening bottles and putting chips in a bowl. “Thanks man, I appreciate this y’know,” Mac calls across the apartment, hands drumming lightly on his thighs.

Dennis turns to him and beams, snacks in hand. “No problem, man. What are friends for?”

He sits down next to Mac after putting the DVD in the player and arranging drinks and food on the table in front of them both. He thumbs the volume down to 20 with the remote, and reaches for a beer, clinking it against Mac’s. “Let movie night commence!” He grins, and Mac replies with a sickly smile as the credits start.

Dennis relaxes into the couch, a smirk across his face. Operation Return of the Mac has been a resounding success. From near-constant snitty remarks about Mac’s new ‘boyfriend’, Mr Dylan Dough (or as he became more colloquially known, “Dyl”); to the genius of darkening the contrast on the TV and laptop incrementally so that Mac had actually thought his eyesight was going (Mac had apparently never learnt you couldn’t _actually_ go blind from masturbating); and of course the final cherry on the cake: the pamphlet exploiting Mac’s fear of eternal damnation; it had been worth every minute of scheming and researching. Mac was back where he should be, on the couch enjoying a classic movie, a beer, some salty snacks, and Dennis himself. “My wife” indeed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy crap this is so late and actually really brief? Anyway. I hope you like it. Please let me know what you think. 
> 
> Chapter title is from 90s RnB classic "Return of the Mack" by Mark Morrison.


	3. Why Did You Give Me So Much Desire, When There Is Nowhere I Can Go To Offload This Desire?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mac’s relieved to find his hard-on flagging somewhat. God was looking out for him. God knew he wasn’t all bad, really.

Mac’s masturbatory abstinence begins the same day as Lent, give or take a few hours. Technically, he has some time after his conversation with Dennis to indulge himself before beginning forty long days and nights of chastity, but all that talk of hell has got his stomach tied in knots, and coming doesn’t seem particularly appealing. Plus, he thinks jacking it so soon after finding out how much it pisses God off is probably a one-way ticket to damnation. If he can at least lay off for Lent, God’ll maybe realize he’s pretty serious about being saved and all, and He’ll do him a solid and let him in to heaven.

Seventy-nine hours, eight cold showers, and three instances of morning wood later, Mac wakes with a start and a hard-on that could cut through steel, from a dream he can’t quite remember. He turns over in bed, gasping as the thin cotton of his shorts brushes the head of his dick.

“Fuck,” he mutters to himself, staring at the ceiling.  Why did he have to read that goddamn pamphlet? He was happy before, with his porn and the Ass Pounder 4000. Now he’s all worked up about hell and sinning, and it’s like the more he tries not to think about it, the more he wants to do it. Why does God always test him like this? He lets out a huff of air, and shakes his head, angrily. It isn’t God’s fault he’s a disgusting deviant.

He folds his hands together in prayer, bringing them up by his mouth, and closes his eyes.

“God, I’m sorry I’ve been so bad” he mutters, voice barely above a whisper. “Truth is, I didn’t think that… doing _that_ was such a big deal. Coz like, why would it be? It just felt good, and honestly, it was like being free I guess, like I was being me at last. That was almost better than the feeling of… you know… like the _physical_ feeling of it, but I guess I was feeling too good anyway, I know you don’t like that so much, Father, and I’m sorry.”

Mac’s relieved to find his hard-on flagging somewhat. God _was_ looking out for him. God knew he wasn’t all bad, really.

“I know I’m on thin ice anyway”, he continues, “what with the being queer and everything. But I’m trying Father, I am. When I invented the Ass Pounder 4000, it was supposed to be an exercise bike, but then there was that one time… and, well, you know what happened. I’ve convinced the guys it’s just a normal bike, but I know you know that that’s not _really_ what I’ve used it for lately…” Mac is dismayed to find his erection is perking back up again at the thought of the Ass Pounder and the memory of recent workouts. He grits his teeth and rolls onto his stomach, hoping that flattening himself against the mattress will assist in suppressing his arousal.

“Anyway, God. I know it’s the devil tempting me and if I just stay strong you’ll help me - won’t you? If you wanted to send me a sign right about now that I was doing the right thing, it would make me feel a whole lot better…”

He waits for a minute, breath bated, stock still.

“God?”

He lifts himself up a little, opening one eye to see if he’s missing some sort of visual sign, but the room is unchanged, and all he can hear is the usual sounds of the street outside and the hum of the air-conditioning.

"Ok, well, maybe not today” he says dejectedly, closing his eyes again and touching his forehead to his still-clasped hands. “If you ever want to make contact though, Father, I’m always listening. Thanks for your glory and sending Jesus and watching over us all anywho. Yours sincerely, Mac McDonald. Amen.”

Mac unfolds his fingers, and pushes both arms under his pillow, resting his head against it so he’s staring at the dingy gray of his bedroom wall, and the pictures of his mom and dad. He sighs sadly and tries to ignore the persistent feeling of his hard-on against the mattress. This was more difficult than he’d expected, but talking to God helped a tiny bit. It was certainly better than talking to Dennis, who just ragged on him, or point blank refused to listen.

Maybe if he’d taken advantage of those last few hours before Lent started he would have been ok.  It could have been like one last hurrah, a proper send-off. He could’ve had a long bath, got all clean and ready for it. Lit some nice scented candles and set up some mood lighting in his room, stolen a lamp from the lounge so he didn’t have to sit under the harsh glare of the naked bulb which hung from the pendant in his ceiling. Opened a bottle of wine, had a couple glasses while reading Men’s Health, and then sat down with Dennis’ laptop and watched his favorite porno. He’d happened upon it by accident one night a few months ago, and had jerked off to it probably at least twice every week since then.

It was pretty short, with no plot to speak of. It was just a twink-y but fit guy working as a bat boy for some made-up baseball team. It showed him helping the team out with various things, no-one paying him much attention, except for one dude; slightly older, taller, a bit more muscular, whose friendly pat on the shoulder after the bat boy brought him a water lingered that little bit too long. The eye contact they made as he drank was that little bit heated. The way he polished his bat that little bit suggestive…

That goes on for a while, and then the bat boy waits behind after the rest of the team have left to watch this older guy practice in the batting cages. The older guy starts getting a bit over-assertive, starts telling the bat boy that he’s his boss and he has to do what he says, that kind of stuff, before forcing him onto his knees and saying, “You love dealing with long, hard things all day long, well get a load of this,” and shoving his cock into the bat boy’s mouth.

The older guy’s kind of rough and he talks dirty the whole time, and at one point he holds his bat in both hands behind the smaller guy's head as he sucks him off, to keep him from pulling away; but Mac can tell he cares for the bat boy, really. He calls him “baby boy” while fucking his mouth, and Mac always gets real close at that bit and has to squeeze the base of his dick to keep from coming.

Finally, the bat boy gets fucked against the wall of the batting cage, bent at the waist with fingers slotted through the wire mesh, while the other guy stands behind him, gripping his narrow hips and thrusting hard, making the smaller man moan and whine. As they both get closer to coming, the older guy grabs the other one’s face and twists his head round so they can kiss, and even though Mac always thinks it looks awkward and kind of painful, that’s usually when he blows his load. Maybe if he’d had that for that one last time, he wouldn’t be so horny right now.

Mac snaps back to earth and opens his eyes to the judgmental stare of his dad, looking at him unblinkingly from the framed photo on his wall. Mac realises he’s grinding his hips into the mattress, and his dick is apparently loving the extra friction because it’s back to full mast.

“Aargh!” he growls, “This is fucking ridiculous!”

He jumps out of bed, painfully aware of his erection, and grabs his robe, knotting it round his waist as he stomps out of his room and across the apartment. Normally he’d knock before bursting through Dennis’ door, but he’s pissed, and it’s not his fault Dennis called the room with the goddamn bathroom in, is it? He slams the door open, greeted by the sight of Dennis wearing an eye mask and what appears to be some sort of thick green cream all over his face, lying prostrate in bed.

Dennis startles out of sleep at the sudden noise and pulls his eye mask off with frantic hands, a “What the fuck?” on his lips.

“I need a shower, it’s an emergency,” Mac snaps in response, barging into the bathroom. Dennis hears him turn the overhead faucet on full and get in, not bothering to shut the door behind him or wait for the water to heat up.

Dennis smirks and reaches over to his bedside table to get a cotton wool pad so he can start removing his facemask. “Cold shower again hey? You wanna be careful with that, you might get sick and I don’t want to have to quarantine you,” he calls over the noise of a rather pitiful trickle coming from the bathroom. The water pressure in their apartment has always been shit.

“Fuck off” Mac shouts back angrily, and Dennis raises his eyebrows in mild amusement. This “no fap” thing was turning Mac into an even pissier little bitch than usual.

“Don’t worry, it’ll be Palm Sunday before you know it and then you’ve only got six more days till Holy Saturday, and you know what that means don’t you?” Dennis says loudly.

There’s no reply, but Dennis knows Mac can hear him.

“That means you can put your palm back to work and start playing with your hole again!” He can’t keep the grin from his voice. Mac telling him about Lent was the gift that kept on giving. Palm Sunday? Holy Saturday? There was Holy Week too, and Dennis had been very proud of his quip about how if Mac didn’t stop using that dildo bike he was bound to make his hole-y weak.

There’s still no reply, but the water stops abruptly and Mac emerges a few minutes later, hair wet and a towel round his waist. Dennis didn’t have chance to notice if Mac had a boner when he had come in earlier, although he assumes as much, but he certainly doesn’t now. Dennis is hardly surprised though, that water is like ice. He fixes Mac with his most shit-eating of smiles. “Feeling nice and refreshed?”

Mac’s face flushes and Dennis can see his hands clenched at his sides. “Look, I know you think this is fucking hilarious bro, but I can assure you it is not funny to me, ok? And I’d very much appreciate it if you gave me some support.”

Dennis’ smile drops, and his face becomes sincere, “Sure, man, I’m sorry. I know this is important to you. If you need support, I’m sure I can lend a hand?” He reaches up, and Mac thinks he might be gesturing for him to come and sit with him on the bed, but no; instead he curls his hand into a loose fist and mimes jacking off. “Like this maybe?”

The growl that comes from Mac’s throat seems to start in his abdomen, and his vision blurs in anger. He surges forward without even thinking, and raises his arms like he’s going to lash out at Dennis. For all his bravado, Dennis flinches, and shrinks back against the headboard of his bed, his eyes wide.

“Fuck!” Mac shouts, turning from Dennis to pick up the nearest inanimate object which just so happens to be Dennis’ phrenology head, an ornament Mac bought him when he was going off to Penn State to study vet stuff and psychology. Mac had wanted to get him a meaningful present, and he couldn’t think of anything vet related, short of a dog skeleton or something, so he’d got the little ceramic bust, even though psychology was only Dennis' minor. Dennis had scoffed, and pointed out that phrenology was bullshit, and didn’t Mac know that, or was he stupid or something?

The memory makes him even angrier and, as hard he can, Mac pitches the bust into the wall next to the door, where it explodes into sharp white fragments and fine particles of dust.

As soon as it happens he feels sated, but within seconds satisfaction turns to guilt, and a heavy sensation of self-loathing settles over him. He turns to Dennis, who’s still pressed back against the headboard. He looks a little green, and Mac isn’t sure if it’s the remnants of his facemask, or if it’s due to his outburst. Either way, he feels terrible.

“Oh my god Den, I’m so sorry,” he says, and moves towards Dennis; to do what, he’s not sure.

Dennis reacts by drawing back even further and Mac feels a sharp stabbing in his chest. Dennis was just being Dennis, Mac should have known better than to try and talk to him about feelings, and other important stuff. Dennis didn’t even _have_ feelings a lot of the time, how could Mac expect him to understand? Fuck, he was stupid.

Dennis had been trying real hard to help him, too. He’d found him all these articles on the internet about re-directing your urges away from sin to helping others, and he’d even let Mac practice by washing the Range Rover, and vacuuming the apartment, and going on little missions to the Wawa for sandwiches. Since the beginning of Lent, they’d spent every night together, and Dennis had pre-approved all the movies they’d watched, making sure they wouldn’t be too arousing for Mac and cause him unnecessary temptation. Dennis had put a password on the laptop too, and called their cell provider and told them he needed a child lock put on one of the phones on his Family and Friends plan, so Mac couldn’t access porn (Mac’s phone was pretty bad, but he’d found he could masturbate to even the most pixelated of videos when he knew that some of those pixels were dicks).

Dennis had been so nice as to take over the management of Mac’s Grindr account as well – Mac hadn’t had much chance to use it, he’d kind of been too nervous, and it was definitely too stimulating for him to be browsing at the moment, but Dennis suggested that he log-on as Mac and answer any messages so that potential future partners wouldn’t be dissuaded by his lack of response. Now that was a real friend.

“I’m sorry, I am. Can I make it up to you? I’ll do anything you want,” Mac says pleadingly. His hands are together again, prayer-like, but this time he isn’t talking to God.

Dennis blinks at him, still surprised by Mac’s outburst, but already considering how he can use it to his advantage. “It’s ok man,” he says quietly, trying to sound as small and scared as he can. “I know you’re under a lot of stress. Just… Can I have some time alone? I… I think I need to be alone right now.”

“Sure, Den, whatever you need. I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me."

Dennis manages to refrain from making a joke about something, or someone, coming over Mac, and instead just nods in reply, as Mac makes his way to the door.

“I’ll tidy this up later, ok?” Mac says, motioning to the white mess on the floor, which he gingerly steps over with bare feet, trying to avoid the sharp shards. He pauses in the doorway. “You sure you don’t want anything?”

“Well, I guess… if you’re feeling any urges… I could let you do the interior of the Range Rover? You could probably easily spend a couple hours on it. I wouldn’t mind…” Dennis offers.

Mac smiles at him. “Sure. That sounds good. When I’m done, I’ll go down to Guigino’s and get some of that linguini you like to go, yeah? That should keep me busy.”

Mac closes the door behind him as he leaves, and Dennis can hear him moving around in the living room. Maybe this jerking-off embargo isn’t such a good idea after all, he thinks to himself.

Dennis shrugs. Something tells him he’ll think differently once he’s full of pasta.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry I am so slow at updating this. I thought posting it a chapter at a time would motivate me to write, but I forgot I am a useless, shiftless, bastard.
> 
> Title is from "I Have Forgiven Jesus" by Morrissey, which is a shame because Morrissey is a massive dick, but that song is so Mac.
> 
> As always, PLEASE let me know what you think, it means the world to me when I get comments or kudos!
> 
> #getmaclaid2k19


	4. Saw the Flame, Tasted Sin, You Burn Me Once Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Perfect day for a game of baseball, right Mac?” Chase Utley says, looking out over the Park, his hand still on Mac’s shoulder. Chase’s touch is burning him through his shirt, and Mac is conscious of how close he’s standing. Sweat prickles at his skin, and he feels a bead of it run slowly down his back to the cleft of his ass.

The sun is high, and the sky is blue and cloudless over Citizens Bank Park, but there’s a light breeze keeping the temperature bearable. The stands are filling up with loud, happy fans; drunk, and excited to see the Phillies kick the Cardinals’ asses again. Everyone’s psyched up from the win the day before, and people have even been saying that this could be the Phillies’ year. Mac smiles from under the peak of his cap as he looks out over the field he’s seen a thousand times before, although never from this position.

_Life is fucking great._

Mac’s jolted from his day-dreaming by a firm hand on his shoulder, and he has to bite his tongue to keep from blurting out a string of excuses why he’s in the Phillies dug-out, sipping from a bottle of Coors and watching the team warm-up, before he remembers he’s supposed to be there. It’s like his sub-conscious is as surprised as he was to win another radio competition, this time to hang out with the Phillies, and assumes he’s going to be forcibly removed by security any minute.

The owner of the hand is not a member of security however, and Mac blushes under the gaze of the man next to him.

“Perfect day for a game of baseball, right Mac?” Chase Utley says, looking out over the Park, his hand still on Mac’s shoulder. Chase’s touch is burning him through his shirt, and Mac is conscious of how close he’s standing. Sweat prickles at his skin, and he feels a bead of it run slowly down his back to the cleft of his ass.

“Yeah!” Mac replies, his voice high and tight, and he mentally curses himself. _Don’t fuck this up like you did at the Flyers!_

Chase turns to him more fully and rubs the material of Mac’s shirt between the thumb and fore-finger of the hand that had just been on his shoulder. “I like your jersey, that you’ve customized it. It makes you look _much_ more bigger. I can tell you’ve been working out.”

Mac’s chest swells with pride. Not only does Chase Utley like that he's slashed the sleeves off his Phillies jersey, he’s noticed how pumped he's looking too. _Can’t wait to rub this in Dennis’ face._

“Maybe we should think about doing the same thing to all our uniforms, properly intimidate those other teams,” Chase adds, flicking the peak of Mac’s baseball cap playfully.

The dug-out’s getting busier. Mac notices Ryan Howard out of the corner of his eye ( _Dee’s gonna shit when I tell her!_ ) and a few other players: Werth, Burrell, Dodd; but Chase is focused solely on Mac, barely acknowledging his teammates, not even appearing to register a slap on the ass from Charlie Manuel himself. Mac's never felt this noticed, this _seen_ by someone before. It’s a sensation he's craved, and it embraces him with a warmth he couldn't have been prepared for.

Chase, meanwhile, is running his hand across the eagle tattoo on Mac's arm.

“Awesome ink, makes you look like a real badass."

If Mac didn't know better, he might think Chase Utley was coming on to him.

_No way, Chase is married, this is just a father-son thing. He's just complimenting me, like a dad would._

_He's just looking at me with affection, like a dad would._

_He’s just... touching my ass... like a dad would?_

“Mm, you been working out those glutes too, Mac,” Chase says quietly, having moved even closer than he was a moment ago.

Mac feels like you could roast marshmallows with the heat coming off his face. He glances round to see if anyone else has noticed that Chase Utley, power-hitting second baseman, Phillie legend, animal rights activist, and all-round Good Guy, is unashamedly groping him in front of the rest of the team, and what looks like half the population of Philadelphia gathering in the stands. Brad Lidge catches his eye and winks.

Mac pauses, dumbfounded. _Maybe it was just a facial tic?_

As if he can read Mac's thoughts, Lidge licks his lips and raises his eyebrows, maintaining eye contact the whole time. Mac can't help but notice the suggestive way he's also polishing his ball, high-up near the crotch of his pants.

_Oh no, wait. He’s not holding a ball, he’s just kind of rubbing himself._

Chase’s hand is still on his ass and Mac faces out towards the field again, before Lidge gets the wrong idea.

 _Maybe this is what life is really like. Maybe when people said porn wasn’t realistic, they were lying, and everyone's actually just randomly sucking and fucking and feeling each other up all the time.  Maybe Chase Utley actually likes me? He_ is _being very nice. What if he wants me to be his Boy Toy and pay for me to live in a little cottage in the grounds of his_ _house, and I’ll pretend to be the gardener but really we’ll be banging in the tool shed where we keep the ride-on mower while his wife’s out shopping, and I’ll be a kept man, and what will I do about Dennis? He’ll hate this arrangement. Maybe if I ask Chase to buy him an Xbox? Should keep him busy, and he can come visit, and Charlie and Frank too. Not Dee though, don’t want her messing it up and acting all gross around the team. God, she’s such a bitch._

_Do I want a boyfriend with a wife though? Seems kind of wrong. Not sure what God would think. But on the other hand, the boyfriend would be an MLB All-Star, and surely exceptions can be made given the circumstances?_

“Hey Mac, you wanna go out to the field and have a catch? I’m sure Lidge will let you borrow his mitt.”

_Ohmygodohmygodohmygod. This is it. This is what my whole life has been leading up to._

“Course, Chase, that would be a.. a fuckin' _dream_ buddy," Mac answers ( _calm down, nerd_ ). “Isn't the game about to start though?” _Why are you talking him out of it you idiot?!_

“Nah, we’ve got time. I'll _make_ time for you.”

Mac couldn’t prevent the grin that breaks across his face even if he wanted to.

Chase takes Mac's hat off and throws it onto the bench behind them, before passing him a worn-looking glove. He tosses an arm over Mac’s shoulder and navigates him out of the dug-out and onto the field. Mac can hear the crowd cheer loudly when they spot Chase’s ‘Utley 26’ jersey, along with some comparatively quiet boos from the Cardinals fans. He’s shaky with adrenaline, but Chase’s arm around him is steady, even as he lifts the other high in the air to salute the fans.

“ _Please welcome to the Citizens Bank Park field Philadelphia Phillies megastar, Chase Utley! And with him, courtesy of the Q Crew at Q102, we've got a very lucky young man who’ll be hanging out with the team today, co-owner and sheriff of Paddy’s Pub, Mac McDonald!”_

“Holy shit!” Mac exclaims excitedly, looking to Chase for affirmation that he had heard correctly. “Holy shit! Dan Baker said my name! Dan Baker! On the PA thing! Legendary announcer Dan Baker!” Mac raises his arms to wave to the crowd, and Chase’s grip gets a little tighter around him. Mac can’t help but goggle, open-mouthed, as he surveys the stadium from the field he’s watched baseball games played on since… well, since they closed the Vet in 2003, but still, it's a Big Fucking Deal.

“The crowd loves you Mac. They know a real Philly tough guy when they see one.” Mac beams broadly in reply, eyes wide. His cheeks are hurting from smiling so much.

The loudspeaker crackles again.

_“Quick update Phillies Phans! There will be a delay in the game starting - I’m reliably informed that Chase and Mac are in fact going to be having a catch! A few stats for you here: Chase is Mac’s hero. Mac likes his hair, and thinks he runs fast. Hopefully Chase will be similarly impressed by Mac’s speed on the field today.”_

Mac fiddles with the mitt, suddenly terrified. All these years of trying to get Chase Utley to have a catch with him, and what if he drops the ball? What if he throws it way out and looks like a total douche?

“Don’t worry,” Chase says in Mac’s ear. “You’ve got this. I got all your letters, y'know? The stickers.. they were a real nice touch. I know you can catch _whatever_ I’m pitching you.”

_He got the letters! He liked the stickers! I knew it was worth keep sending them!_

“Yes sir!” Mac grins again, confidence renewed.

“So, go get ‘em, you can do it!” Chase gives Mac a push towards the centre of the field and a hard smack on the ass. Mac jogs away ( _why are sports guys so obsessed with slapping each other on the butt?)_ until he’s stood on the pitcher’s mound, about 50 feet from Chase. Mac waves happily at him, and then at the crowd, beaming as they cheer again. He can’t even hear any booing from the Cardinals fans now.

_Maybe people just like me? But... why?  People don’t usually like me. What did I do different today... need to remember so I can do it every day from now on..._

“You ready buddy?” Chase shouts and Mac nods, squatting down a little and punching his left hand into the deep cup of the glove covering his right, eyes trained on Chase’s fingers and the ball in them.

The familiar baseball charge theme starts over the PA, and the crowd sing along, rowdy and off-key, nonsensical _‘bah-bah-ba-bas’_ filling the air, faster and faster. Mac’s pulse is racing and his mouth’s dry and he hopes Dennis is watching this, coz it fucking beats some shitty charity event at a conference suite in Atlantic City, that’s for sure. Even if Dennis and Chase did get wasted together, and Chase had said that Dennis’ magic was cool and that he was good at wrestling. They were having a catch, and Mac's fairly sure Chase likes him.

_So suck my fat dick, Dennis, you prick._

Chase winds back his arm before catapulting it forward. He releases the ball, and everything seems to happen in slow motion. Mac doesn't dare blink as the ball soars in an arc towards him, fast and straight with just a bit of spin. He squints against the glaring sunshine and lifts his glove to meet the sphere of white leather whistling down towards him, the red stitching a blur.

The impact to the glove jerks Mac's hand back and he exhales sharply in shock while the stadium echoes with a fanfare of ‘ _da-da-da-DA-da-DA!’_ and the crowd goes crazy.

_I did it! I didn't make a fool of myself for once! Maybe I’m not a total loser after all!_

Chase runs over and throws his arms round him and they spin round to the sound of “Mac! Mac! Mac!” coming from the stands.

“I knew you could do it! Nice work.”

They stop spinning and Mac stares, dazed, into Chase's eyes. He feels like if he was in a cartoon his pupils would have been replaced by little pink hearts. Hell, they might have been for all he knew.

Chase is regarding Mac’s face like someone might scrutinize a ‘Where’s Waldo?’ cartoon: not just looking, but _studying_ him, and Mac would find it intimidating if it wasn’t so weirdly sexy.

They’re inches apart, and Chase is still embracing Mac. He’s fixated on Mac’s mouth and Mac’s fairly certain the gap between the two of them is closing.

Chase tilts his head to the side, and Mac knows that move, he’s seen Dennis do it a million times, usually right before he sticks his tongue down some girl’s throat. Mac mirrors Chase’s movement. He closes his eyes and his lips part without a second thought, chin jutting forward to meet the other man, anticipation causing a tight, glittering pang in the bottom of his stomach.

From nowhere, a high, angry buzz fills the air, and Mac’s eyes fly open. Chase’s face is turned to the source of the noise, and Mac’s mouth closes with a click of teeth and a sigh.

“What is it?” he asks, shrugging himself free of Chase’s arms.

 _“Phillies Phans! Are you pheeling phighting phit?! Time to show your phondness for America’s phaaaaavorite mascot – it’s the Phillie Phanatic!”_ the speakers blast out.

Mac doesn’t know how he knows that the announcer is using “ph” instead of “f”; he can just sort of tell. He now sees that the vibrating noise which is eating at his skull like an angry hornet, is emanating from the Phanatic, or more accurately, the quad bike he is doing a lap of the stadium on. Normally Mac’d be pumped to see the Phillies mascot - he’s kinda funny in a dorky way - but Mac had never realised until today what a cock-blocker he was.

“Ha! Look at him go!” Chase says, making a weird honking laugh as the huge green bird tools around the field, tooting his long thin tongue at the crowd and pumping his fists in the air. Mac is mentally adding another name to the list of giant birds he fucking hates, scowling as the Phanatic stops the bike in front of the Cardinals’ dug-out and hops off it.

“Oh man, I love this bit!” Chase sounds unreasonably mirthful, like he’s not seen this same old shit a million times. “He’s gonna give the Cardinals hell!” He nudges Mac in the ribs and adds, “This is usually when he’ll like stomp on a helmet from the opposing team, or pretend to wipe his ass with one of their jerseys, it’s hilarious.”

Mac smiles a little, in spite of himself. He supposes Chase’s enthusiasm is kind of cute, he’s just not used to guys showing any emotion except for maybe anger – he grew up with _Luther_ for fuck’s sake. He’s pretty sure Chase has shown more depth of feeling while watching the Phanatic than his dad would removing someone’s kidney with a rusty pen-knife, or finding out his only son had suffered an untimely and painful death.

_Am I actually that un-used to seeing someone truly happy that it’s irritating to me? When's the last time I saw anyone have a good time? Dee laughed a lot when she tricked Stripper Mike’s daughter into touching his asshole, but that was more like degeneracy or a mental break than actually being contented…_

_Is no-one I know happy?_

Mac shakes his head, trying to clear the fog.

_Just stay in the moment and enjoy this – forget about all that shit. You’re having a great time and you can decide the best way to repress all that other stuff later._

Mac watches the Phanatic dancing in front of the Cardinals. Fans of both sides laugh when the St Louis team’s pitcher runs at the Phanatic as if he’s about to go for him, but instead joins him in what looks like the Carlton dance from Fresh Prince. Chase is clapping and cheering along too, but he keeps glancing over to Mac to check he’s ok, and that he’s still enjoying himself, and Mac’s heart swells when he notices.

The Phanatic reaches into a pocket ( _Didn’t think birds had pockets_ ) and pulls out a black book, maybe about the size of a passport but a couple of inches thick. He holds it up high and walks back and forth in front of the dug-out, turning this way and that, so everyone in the stadium can see it.

Mac and Chase are a ways away, and Mac squints at the book.

“Is… Is that a bible?” he says, confused.

“I dunno, maybe?” Chase responds, clearly unconcerned. “Maybe coz they’re the Cardinals: Catholic link, y’know? I think you’re right actually, it says on the front.”

Mac’s impressed that Chase made that connection – he wouldn’t have. Chase is like the perfect guy. He’s hot, he’s smart, he must have good eyesight to see the title of the book from so far away, he’s got _great_ hair…

“What the fuck?!” Mac exclaims, as he watches the Phanatic open the book and begin to rip pages out and throw them onto the dirt in from of the Cardinals. He proceeds to stomp on each page and then holds the remains of the bible in front of him before sticking his tongue out at it and blowing a raspberry.

Mac is momentarily speechless.

“Wha- Why- Who the- What is this jabroni _doing_? Is the Phanatic a Muslim or something?” Mac barks angrily at Chase, who’s still smiling at the mascot’s antics. “The mascot for the Philadelphia Phillies cannot be a Muslim Chase, it doesn’t make any worldly sense! He’s from the goddamn Galapagos!”

Chase’s smile fades slightly.

“Those islands are pretty much solely Christian, Chase; they are!”

Chase frowns and shakes his head lightly, “C’mon Mac, don’t get stressed out, it’s just a prank. He’s razzing the Cardinals, it’s nothing more than that.”

The Phanatic throws the bible onto the floor and starts jumping up and down on it, and the crowd goes wild. Even the Cardinals fans seem to love it. He reaches into his pocket again ( _Pockets? Seriously? Completely inaccurate_ ) and brings out a small bottle, the contents of which he starts liberally squirting onto the book where it lies in front of the dug-out.

“Oh no…” Mac says. “He isn’t.”

The Phanatic throws the bottle behind him and silently addresses the crowd, repeatedly lifting his arms ( _Wings?_ ) up and down, hyping them up even more. Mac can tell Chase is excited too, he’s grabbed on to Mac’s forearm and is gripping it hard.

The Phanatic lights a single match, and drops it onto the bible. Mac hears the _whoomp_ noise as the lighter fluid catches fire, and it goes up like Dee’s cheap nylon dress had that time Frank set her alight.

“What the fuck, dude!” Mac yells at the Phanatic, blood boiling. “You can’t do that to the word of God, bro! That’s fucked up!” He starts towards the giant bird, who’s turned to Mac and his shouting, and is staring at him, with two large black pupils each swimming in an unblinking white ovoid framed by long pink eyelashes.

But Chase’s hold on Mac’s arm is strong, and he’s pulled back. Mac turns to Chase to protest.

“Chase, come on, that guy is a fuckin’-“

Mac’s cut short by Chase’s mouth against his. His guard immediately drops, and he forgets what he was angry about, forgets everything. The inside of his head is a dial tone.

Chase is gripping both of Mac’s arms and he continues to pull the other man’s body towards him, despite them being as close as two people can get without being inside one another.

Chase kisses like a baseball All-Star – he’s not great at it, but he’s been told he’s good at everything so often that he believes he is, and he explores Mac’s mouth with a confident tongue that has never been told “no”. Mac can smell smoke and he wonders if he’s having a stroke – he heard that’s a symptom – as he kisses Chase Utley in the middle of Citizens Bank Park stadium before a crowd of 40,000 people, and two of the top ten best Major League Baseball teams in North America, and a man dressed as a green flightless bird, burning a bible, which at least explains the smell.

Chase pulls away and Mac pouts.

“You know I could buy and sell you, right Mac?” Chase says, one eyebrow raised.

Mac shrugs in response, but he can’t help feeling a little demeaned, and more than a little aroused.

“Yeaaaah..” Chase breathes out as he caresses Mac’s face. He’s got a baseball bat in his hand, and he keeps mindlessly tapping it against his shin. Mac doesn’t know where it came from.

“I could give you everything you ever wanted. And I want to, you know? I want our relationship to be a real home run. But so far, I’ve only got to.. what? First base?”

Mac feels that same high-strung sensation in his stomach. He tries to forget the thousands of people watching, but maybe he doesn’t mind it that much actually.

“I don’t make do with first base, Mac. You should know that.” Chase gives a tight-lipped smile. “Or do you think I’m some sort of fucking loser?”

Mac shakes his head vigorously. “No, no, not at all, you’re my hero, man, I-“

“Then why don’t you get on your goddamn knees?” Chase states flatly.

As much as Mac knows it’s wrong to give Chase Utley head in the middle of Citizens Bank Park, he sinks down onto the pitcher’s mound without a word, his mouth already watering at the thought of it, and starts undoing Chase's belt.

_Is this normal? Do normal people think about dick like a starving guy would think about a steak?_

Access achieved, Mac frees Chase’s cock from its material prison and assesses it – smooth, cut, not too long but thick; perfect in other words. He glances up to find Chase looking at him, bottom lip between his teeth, and he nods, encouraging Mac to do it, to suck him off in front of a noisy mob of Phillies fans, so Mac does.

_“Looks like Chase is getting some pre-game encouragement from Mac there, he is really going for it! A true fan, even if he is a dirty, filthy slut.”_

Mac gasps, one hand round the base of Chase's dick, the other gripping his thigh. Dan Baker calling him a slut over the PA while he drools on Chase Utley’s cock is totally doing it for him. Chase is fucking his mouth slow and deep, and normally Mac would struggle not to choke thanks to his hair trigger gag reflex, but he's finding it strangely easy to swallow him down. Their technique is smooth and neat and it just feels _right_ , like he and Chase fit together, two parts of a well-oiled machine.

Chase is still holding the baseball bat and every now and then he’ll tap Mac’s leg with it, just barely, and Mac’s not sure if it’s on purpose but it’s like this ever-present threat which, again, Mac is finding hot as fuck, and he sure is learning a lot about himself today.

Chase grips Mac’s face with the hand not holding the bat and Mac opens his eyes to look up at him. He slaps Mac's cheek lightly with his open palm a couple of times, making Mac blink, and then he’s pushing Mac down and Mac has to move his hand from where it was on the shaft, and he's going all the way until his lips touch short rough hair and Chase is swatting at his face again, harder this time. Mac makes a moan in response, with Chase’s dick pressing against the back of his throat, and the resulting sensation must be good because Chase groans and his hips falter.

Mac tries to pull back, but he realises Chase is holding the baseball bat behind the nape of his neck, one hand on either side of Mac’s head, and he can’t move more than an inch or two before he feels cool wood on his red hot skin.

_Just like in that porno._

Mac is powerless to do a lot other than suck, breathing through his nose and moving his head as much as he can, which isn’t very much at all, but he's desperate to please Chase so he continues, feeling used and pathetic and so fucking turned on that the pang in his abdomen has evolved into a full-blown ache.

_“Ladies and gentleman, I've never quite seen anything like this before. This is an interesting technique from McDonald, who appears to be taking on the passive role of a human fleshlight or other such inanimate object. To see someone debase themselves so completely at the whim of another person... well, I don’t know whether to be impressed or sickened!”_

At that moment, the sheer absurdity of the situation he's in hits Mac ( _What the fuck is going on?_ ), but before he can think about it too much, Chase is pulling him closer using the bat and thrusting into his mouth harder and faster.

_“Looks like Utley is upping his game now, that’s a definite jackhammer approach, but luckily this little slut can more than handle it.”_

Mac blushes with self conscious pride, and his throat contracts from the whine the announcer's words arouse, which comes out as a choked gargle.

_“I think you'll all agree that Mac’s been a real good sport here today. This announcer wants to know: Chase, when you gonna fuck the poor guy?!”_

Mac is shocked to hear Dan Baker say the f-word ( _that_ never _would have happened when I was a kid_ ). He feels like he's found his stride with this blow job stuff though. He's not had much practice, but he’s taking it like a pro: no gagging, good sucking action, eye contact, just the right amount of saliva...

The noise of the crowd changes suddenly, from an unintelligible commotion of yelling and shouting to a single aggressive chant. Mac can’t quite make it out at first, just two short words followed by three staccato stomps, but then his brain unravels it.

“Phuck him!” _stompstompstomp_.

“Phuck him!” _stompstompstomp._

Mac doesn't know how it happens or when, but he blinks and he's on his back in the dirt of the pitcher's mound, his pants folded up beneath him, lifting his hips like a makeshift pillow. His dick’s hard and pressed against his stomach and both his hands are being held above his head by just one of Chase’s. Chase’s other hand is around Mac’s ankle, his leg hooked over Chase’s shoulder.

“Phuck him!” _stompstompstomp._

Chase’s face is close to Mac’s, and Mac feels like he should be more uncomfortable given his position and the unnatural stretch of his leg (one knee is practically against his chest) but he isn't, and Chase is sliding his cock inside of him even though they didn't do any prep but it doesn't hurt, it just feels amazing, especially when Chase starts moving his hips and kisses Mac full on the mouth.

The angle means Chase is brushing Mac’s prostate with almost every thrust, and when Chase stops kissing him and pulls away, Mac makes eye contact with him and Chase smiles and Mac nearly comes.

_Can’t come yet, got to last. Think unsexy thoughts, like Dee's horrible sharp elbows... her massive gunboat feet... her huge man hands, much bigger than Dennis'.... Dennis has such slender fingers... imagine us entwining them, walking down the street hand in hand... imagine them stretching me open…_

Mac open his eyes: that train of thought was getting dangerous too.

_Think giant bird! Giant bird. Giant goddamn bird!_

Mac turns his head towards the Cardinals dug-out and sure enough there's the Phanatic, still staring at them, immobile, while the bible burns next to him. He looks even bigger from where Mac is on the floor, and Mac's happy to discover that the green feathery creature is not attractive to him in any way.

_Just focus on that ugly thing and you can maybe hold out._

Mac's panting, mouth open, and Chase is still going for it, making small breathless grunting noises. The ache has become a dull throb in Mac’s pelvis, but he thinks he can stave off his orgasm for now.

 _Pretty ironic that a lot of guys think about baseball to last longer when this is the most surreal, sexy fuck I’ve ever had. I’ll probably start getting a hard-on from just smelling cheap shitty hot dogs after this, I'll be jerking off to_ ‘Take Me Out to the Ball Game’ _..._

The Phanatic points at Mac, long wing extended. Mac bites his lip at a particularly pleasurable wave running through him, right down to his toes, and Chase tightens his grip on Mac's ankle. Mac didn't think someone touching your ankle could be hot. He wonders where his shoes went.

_What does this fucking bird want now._

The Phanatic just stands and gawks and Mac doesn’t break eye contact with him, vision still fixed while he struggles a little under Chase, lifting his hips and licking his lips and uttering soft ohgods and jesuschrists and ohfucks under his breath.

The Phanatic finally moves, both upper limbs reaching for the head of the costume and lifting it away.

_What a dick... he's ruining the illusion._

The mascot holds his head under one arm, and Mac realizes he recognizes the human head that’s been revealed. The human head which is being shaken disdainfully from side to side, disgust written large across delicate features Mac knows better than he knows his own, revulsion so clear that Mac can see it even from yards away. A feeling of pure shame hits Mac like a steam train.

“Ugh fuck, Dennis" Mac says, the words almost strangling him, and he comes, eyes locked with his roommate.

Mac wakes up while he’s still coming, intense and unrestrained. He's got both arms round his pillow and there's a wet feeling between him and the mattress. After a couple of moments it’s over, but his legs are still shaking as he rolls onto his back, and his heart is racing.

It takes him some time to realise where he is and what's going on. He rattles through the emotions he's dragged back into reality with him, raw and authentic as anything he's ever felt.

A nagging feeling of unease ( _Dennis is upset with me, he’s the Phillie Phanatic and he burned a bible and he watched me get fucked by Chase Utley and he'll never let me forget it_ ) is washed away by a relief that that hadn’t actually happened, which makes way for a giddy excitement ( _but me and Chase! He definitely likes me! And the crowd were cheering for me, and they liked me too, but best of all Chase cares about me and he listened to me and we had a connection_ ) which is soon squashed by the realisation that none of it was real, neither the good nor the bad, and Mac just relishes the feeling of having come instead, of being dirty and depraved ( _oh God the thought of all those people watching, and me just doing what I’m told, just fucking taking it, and it’s so bad and_ I'm _so bad_ ) until finally he just feels dirty and disgusting and sad and lonely.

He waits for a minute, staring at the ceiling, and then turns to check the time.

04:37. He’s been asleep for about 3 hours. Another fucking wet dream.

_I hope this doesn’t count as sinning coz there’s not much I can do about it... fourth one in six nights, it’s worse than when I was a kid… And I won’t be able to get back to sleep again either. Fuck._

He gets up and starts stripping the sheet off his bed, glancing, irritated, at the dryer in the corner, which is already loaded with sleep shorts and bedding rendered unusable by other nocturnal emissions.

 _Goddamn Chase Utley. Goddamn Phillie Phanatic. Goddamn god_ damn _Dennis fucking Reynolds._

He bundles up the sheet ready to take down to the laundry room before Dennis can see it and make some shitty comment, grabbing a beer from the fridge on his way past.

 _Goddamn_ _Lent_. 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew it took me ages to write this for some reason! Hope you liked it and it wasn't too weird. I would just like to note that when I began writing this, Rob hadn't actually had his catch with Chase Utley , so it felt less despicable, but what was I supposed to do? I'd already started writing! Also, I know fuck all about baseball, so hopefully I used the right terms and said the right names and things.
> 
> Title is from Aberdeen by Cage the Elephant which is such a good song.
> 
> As always PLEASE tell me what you think! I live for comments and all that good stuff.


	5. You Let Me Complicate You: Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this was supposed to be one chapter, but it's turned into a wily beast so I've spilt it into three parts. 
> 
> This is dedicated to the anonymous person who sent me a message on tumblr saying they liked my shit. I would assume it was my mum but I don't think she knows I write porn on the internet.
> 
> So anyway, anon, thank you.
> 
> The formatting on this was all mad and shit before, hopefully I've fixed it now but let me know if not or if there's any errors etcetera.

_ur hot. Want 2meet?_

_Maybe..._

_What did you have in mind?_

_w/e u want sexy_

_Interesting._

_Pics? :)_

_You first._

[Image received]

_Not bad... You vers?_

_I can be. 4 the rite guy. ;)_

_ur turn_

[Image sent]

_...?_

_You speechless?_

_...U sure thats u in ur profile pic?_

_What the fuck is that supposed to mean, bro?_

_Relax ‘bro’ u just dont look as ripped in the pic u sent. Nice dick tho._

_I can assure you I am just as ripped as my profile picture, maybe more so, and definitely hotter than anyone you’ve ever had, so you might want to watch what you say if you want me to fuck you._

_w/e u say dude_

_u seem kinda angry_

_its rly not a turn-on_

_I dont fk with pasty old twinks w anger mgmt issues sry_

_Pasty old twink?_

_You cannot be serious._

_I am an adonis._

_I am a GOD._

_How’s being a little bitch working out for you?_

_Especially with that tiny-meat you call a cock. You getting laid much? I should have guessed, you have a face that says ‘I have a micro-dick and an even smaller brain.’_

_You know what dude, you should change your profile – with a dick that small you’d be more honest labeling yourself a woman._

_I came to Grindr to find a guy to fuck, if I wanted pussy I would have tried Tinder._

 

[Your message cannot be delivered.]

 

Dennis rolls his eyes and drops his phone to the desk with a clatter. Blocked again.

_These gay guys are such snowflakes. And what a bunch of assholes! “You don’t look as ripped.” No shit buddy, I look a hundred times better in that dick pic I sent._

Dennis picks up his phone once more, gets the photo he just sent to “PhillyBeefsteak” ( _what was I thinking responding to someone with that name in the first place)_ up on the small screen, and studies it. Tries to imagine what he’d think if he received such a picture. Like all the photos he’d received through the app, and all the photos he’d sent in response (and there had been a few), there was no face to be seen, no identifying features; or at least none that could be picked out of a line-up where clothes were being worn. His penis was front and centre, obviously, hard and held in the grip of his right hand, his thumb skimming the head; while his other hand remained out of shot, operating the phone. The angle was perfect, made him look even bigger than he actually was, not that he needed the extra help, of course. But Dennis knew his dick looked good, he’d been told enough times. What was concerning him was this constant assertion that he wasn’t fit enough, that he wasn’t as ripped as Mac was, and that that was somehow a bad thing.

Dennis zooms in on the small area of torso that can be seen. It’s flat, toned, muscles in all the right places… He doesn’t _get_ it.

_What’s with these gay guys? This photo - it’s a real man. That profile picture - is Mac looking all fucking ‘roided up and weird! I leave him alone for a couple of months while I try to have a normal life in North Dakota, and what happens? He turns into the goddamn Rock, looks like a veiny salami._

Dennis taps on Grindr, opening Mac’s account and then his profile photo. It’s just Mac, wearing a tight, sleeveless t-shirt ( _what else_ ), and grinning like an idiot. The photo’s of him when he was at his biggest, when Dennis had just got back from North Dakota. Mac had basically spent all the time Dennis had been away in the gym, and he could tell Mac thought he looked good, so he’d nipped that in the bud with a quick “You gain weight while I was gone?”

Dennis had enjoyed seeing the broad smile melt from Mac’s face. He wishes he could do the same to the photo on the screen, but it just beams at him, mocking.

“Look at those arms. Ludicrous,” Dennis mutters to himself, and clicks the power button on his phone so the display turns black.

_It’s fucking gross, and it’s certainly not natural. Not like my physique, which I think anyone would agree is nigh-on perfection. Serves me right for trying to keep Mac’s Grindr profile active while he’s on the semi-retired-hand wagon, you try and do a good deed and what do you get? A bunch of savages who’d rather look at a hunk of gristle than a premium slice of filet mignon._

Dennis puts his phone down again and plays absently with a pen, failing to notice how chewed the cap already is before he puts it in his mouth.

_These gays aren’t all without merit though, some of them have been very appreciative of my photos. What did that one guy say… EggplantEater69, he loved them. Very keen to sample the goods._

He drums his fingers on one of the many piles of paperwork that litter every surface round the small, dingy room. Paddy’s back office is no monument to good record-keeping.

_Maybe I’ll let him. It’s been a while, but… well, desperate times call for desperate measures, and the women round here are god-awful bitches._

As if on cue, the door slams open and Dee comes barrelling in, followed closely by Frank and Charlie.

“Dennis, you need to do something, this is getting goddamn ridiculous,” Dee begins, before Frank starts talking over her.

“Dennis, it’s Mac, the sonuvabitch: he’s a liability! Now I’ve tried to understand him, and there was a time, yes, when I thought I got it, but… He’s gone way down again in my estimation, wayyyy down” Frank declares, Charlie nodding vociferously behind him.

“Oh yeah?” Dennis says, leaning back in the office chair, hands clasped behind his head. “And how, pray tell, does someone go down in the estimation of a man who has in recent memory not only _had_ a tapeworm, but also _named_ said tapeworm; _and_ caught chlamydia off a now-deceased hooker?”

Frank frowns. “You talkin’ ‘bout Roxy? Because I won’t hear a word against that woman, Dennis! She was an angel, with a heart made of gold.”

“And a vagina made of hazardous waste, amIright?” Dee sniggers. “Blammo!” she calls out, one hand cupped round her mouth, while at the same time reaching across the desk to Dennis for a high five.

“That’s my new thing you guys, when I drop a wicked burn, I’m gonna say “blammo”; it’s like an ironic Ed McMahon-style catchphrase kinda deal,” she adds as an aside, still holding her arm aloft.

Dennis studiously ignores it, and blinks slowly at her, before Frank continues.

“Deandra, you gonna shut your trap? Roxy shoulda been your stepmom, and you’d do well to remember that. Your whore mother and I brought you up better than to disrespect the dead.”

Dee dejectedly folds her arms in front of her chest, and fixes Dennis with a death stare, but remains silent.

“So anyway, Dennis, as I was sayin’ – Mac’s becoming a problem.”

“Yeah! He’s being a real asshole!” Charlie blurts out.

“Charlie, what he did to you was actually completely understandable,” Dee says. “In fact, I’m still pretty pissed with you myself, I really do think I’m owed some compensation...”

“Yeah, I gotta say, you kinda had it comin’” Frank notes, turning to Charlie. “What he did to me was a whole lot worse, lemme tell you…”

“No! No! Nonononononono!!!!!” Charlie shrieks, as Dee and Frank both proceed to loudly argue that whatever Mac’s done to Charlie is almost definitely completely in proportionate retaliation to whatever Charlie did to him, and that it totally 100% absolutely pales in comparison to Mac’s perceived slights against them.

“Hey! HEY!” Dennis shouts, and the cacophony stops abruptly. “Let me get this straight. Am I to assume Mac is driving you all crazier than normal, and you, for some reason, think _I_ am the man to resolve it?”

“Yes!” Charlie says, still slightly shrieky, but somewhat calmer than a few moments prior. “It’s this not jacking-off thing! It’s turned him into a grade-A dickhead fuck-hole!”

“He’s a nightmare,” Dee says, nodding in agreement.

“A real fruitcake,” Frank chimes in, solemnly.

“Whoa whoa whoa.” Dennis says, sitting up straight in the desk chair, palms flat on the table in front of him. “You all know about the Lent hand-job embargo?”

“Well yeah Dennis, you told me, and I told Frank, and obviously he told Charlie, so yeah, we all know,” Dee says, like she hadn’t been sworn to secrecy, the bitch. “I don’t get why it’s such a big secret anyway, so he gave up choking the chicken to get into heaven or some shit, big whoop.”

_Because I know you fuckers, and you’ll try and sabotage him; and currently there are way too many benefits to Mac’s abstinence for me to allow him to go back to flying solo._

“I think what he’s doing is very admirable actually, and you need to leave him alone to reach self-actualisation” Dennis responds, hoping his tone conveys ‘I care about my best friend and his life goals’, and not ‘This is working in my favor and you shit-for-brains dummies better not fuck it up’.

“Oh bullshit” Dee scoffs, “I don’t know how, but you’ve orchestrated this whole situation in some way and I don’t know what, but you’re getting something out of it, while the rest of us are left to suffer the awful consequences of you turning Mac into some cum-filled powder keg, just waiting to blow!”

Dennis’ mouth drops open in faux-outrage (and a little bit in genuine disgust at the phrase “cum-filled powder keg”). “Deandra, I don’t know what you’re implying but I am merely supporting my friend in his time of need, and I’m sorry that you’re so selfish that you can’t possibly put up with some minor inconveniences while Mac does what he can for Jesus!”

Dee barks out a laugh. “Ohhh that is too much –“

“Botha youse! Knock it off!” Frank interrupts, slamming his fist down on the table and stopping Dee before she can return fire at her brother.

“Dee, you’re probably right, but we can’t prove Dennis is trying to wind Mac up tighter than a nun’s snatch so you're gonna hafta drop it, alright?”

Frank points at Dennis, fixing him with a cold stare. “And Dennis, I don't doubt that Dee’s correct in her assessment of what's going on here, but God knows I've got better things to do than try and work out the screwed-up dynamics of your weird relationship with Mac.”

Dennis scratches his eyebrow and looks bored.

“But the fact is: there’s three of us and only one’a you, which by my calculations makes you out-voted, and we need you to do something about this Mac situation. It’s only a matter of time before it starts affecting you too y’know, and in the meantime, it’s messing up the whole vibe of the bar and causing all sortsa problems.”

Dennis bites the inside of his cheeks in irritation. “Oh yeah, like what? Why should I give a shit?”

“Because he’s a goddamn dick!” Charlie shrieks again, proffering a disembowelled VHS tape, its shiny black innards knotted and tangled, hanging down from the plastic casing like squid-ink pappardelle pasta.

 

_Three days earlier – Mac vs Charlie: Dance/Off_

“Hey-o!” Charlie calls cheerfully as he makes his way through the back entrance of Paddy’s, startling when he notices Mac silently turned towards the crappy old TV in the rear corner of the bar, remote control in hand and face like thunder.

“Hooo! Didn’t expect to see you there Mac, whatcha….”

Charlie stops short when he realises he recognises the discordant musical intro coming from the TV.

_“Crabs? Are they underwater spiders_

_Crabs – can they see inside our miii-iiinds”_

The tiny Charlie on screen is seated on a small stool, facing away from the camera so only his back’s visible. He picks out an arpeggio flourish on the keyboard in front of him between lyrics, before transitioning into a quick staccato melody of jerky chords. When he starts singing again, his voice his high, and the sound coming from the television’s cheap speakers is tinny and distorted.

_“Crawling behind my eyes_

_One of those creepy crab-spies_

_Stealing ideas, talks in my ear_

_Oh creepy crab leave me behiiiind! Oh little crabby boy –“_

Mac hits pause and the tiny Charlie stops, the image flickering every couple of milliseconds. Full-size Charlie opens his mouth to ask why Mac’s watching his video but is interrupted.

“What” Mac says, and Charlie can tell he’s speaking through gritted teeth, “the _fuck_ is this.”

Charlie’s eyebrows shoot towards his hairline at the vitriol behind Mac’s words. He lets out a puff of air and says, “Well, it’s not for your eyes bro to be honest, I didn’t make it for you, soooo…” He cocks his head to one side. “I’d have to say it’s none of your beeswax.”

Mac turns slowly towards the smaller man, pinching the bridge of his nose now, with eyes shut and the TV clicker still nestled loosely in his other hand.

“I mean it, Charlie, what is it” he says, opening his eyes to look at his friend from under a Neanderthal brow knitted with consternation.

Charlie grimaces. He assumed that Mac would be less tense now he was finally able to be himself after decades of suppression, but lately he’s been more uptight than ever. Charlie doesn’t want to be the catalyst to Mac going crazy and massacring them all.

He sighs but answers, despite his reluctance to.

“It’s an audition tape. For _The Voice_ ,” he says quietly. “I wanna meet Blake Shelton.”

Mac clasps his hands together round the remote and brings them to his face. He bites down on the knuckle of his index finger and murmurs around it, “An audition tape for _The Voice_ because he wants to meet Blake Shelton…” He’s not blinking, and it reminds Charlie of Luther. Charlie shudders a little.

“Yeah, I’ve just always wanted to meet Blake Shelton, y’know?” Charlie adds, hoping more detail will help. “I want to tell him how much he sucks. He’s such a douche, he’s actually got an album called _Blake Shelton’s Barn and Grill_. How dumb is that?!”

“And why aren’t you facing the camera?” Mac asks, his voice low, before he goes back to gnawing on his knuckle.

“That’s like the whole gimmick, you don’t face the judge people, there’s this chair that swings round if you’re good. Thought I’d recreate it for the audition video, you know?”

“That’s… that’s not the way it works Charlie,” Mac says tiredly, and Charlie thinks he might seem less angry now, and more defeated instead, which he considers a triumph on his part. “The point is, you have taped over my video.”

“What?” Charlie responds, confused. “Nah, I didn’t. I used one from the back office, and it was some shit film I’ve never heard of, _Dan Simons 2_ I think it was.”

“ _Dan Simons 2_? Fuck Charlie, it says _Dance Moms 2_! _DANCE MOMS_ , SEASON 2! That was _my_ video! What the hell kind of name for a film is _Dan Simons 2_ for god’s sake?” Mac’s hands are balled into fists, and his eyes are alight with rage. This is what Charlie was worried for. This is how the massacre starts. Might as well go out fighting.

“Well excuuuuse me!” Charlie yells back. “I thought it was a movie with a guy’s name, like _John Wick_ , or _Jerry Maguire_ , or _Charlie Saingels_! And I thought it was _Dan Simons 2_ , and since we’ve not seen _Dan Simons 1_ I figured no-one would care if I taped over it!”

“I care! I care, Charlie! Oh my god! Your goddamn illiteracy! I could _kill_ you!”

“It was Dee’s writing on it, how’s I supposed to know it’s yours? Jeez man, I didn’t know it was your special movie about _dancing_ _moms_ or whatever, I just needed a VHS for the camcorder so I could record my audition and it was there! Why are you even watching moms dancing, was this for your thing at the prison coz I thought that was all done..”

“No! It wasn’t for my thing at the prison” Mac says, spitting out the words as if they taste bad. “ _Dance Moms_ is…” He groans, like he’s sad again. “ _Dance Moms_ is this reality TV show that Dee used to watch, she taped all the episodes off of cable when they were on years ago and I started watching it because it’s… It’s just addictive, ok?”

Charlie’s looking at him like he’s grown two heads, and Mac bows his in shame.

“Reality TV? Oh my god, is this that thing with all the little kids and the dance woman and the awful moms –“ Charlie gasps and his lip curls in disgust. “Ew! Why were you watching that? Oh jesus, Mac. Are you ok? Why were you-“

Mac is silent.

“You’re not into those kids are you?”

Mac’s head jerks up at that. “No! Jesus no! Charlie, there’s just… there’s _reasons_ , alright? And it was actually really good before you filmed your stupid audition on there!”

Mac pauses.

“Wait a second.”

He turns back to the TV, and points the remote at the screen. He presses fast forward and the screen goes black, the vague shape of him reflected in the dusty glass.

“Auditions are short, right?” Mac says, and presses play. The screen comes back to life to show Charlie again, back still to the camera, still in the same poorly-lit spot of the bar he had been earlier in the video.

_“- tiny trees_

_Acorns acorns sock full of acorns_

_Smash them with a shoe_

_The man he is coming coming for me_

_What can I what can I -"_

Mac presses the remote control and the screen darkens.

“Yeah, auditions aren’t that long, I’ll still be able to find out what happened to Paige, she had to have got over that plantar wart removal.”

Mac's hand moves slightly and Charlie appears again.

_“- fuck you guy fuck you -”_

“Er, Mac,” Charlie says carefully, as Mac jerks the remote towards the TV once more, anger coming off him in waves as he continues talking to himself.

“Auditions aren’t that goddamn long, I’ve seen auditions, _dance_ auditions, and Paige, she’ll make a full recovery, those warts won’t keep her down. She’ll be back in that pyramid before you can say ‘junior elite dance team’ Abby, you old cow…”

“Mac,” Charlie repeats.

“These tapes last five hours, no singing audition can last that long. No way. That would be insane. Literally _only_ _an_ _insane_ _person_ would make a video audition tape that lasted a full five hours…”

The screen comes back to life and rather than the Abby Lee Miller dance studio, the TV still shows Paddy’s Pub, and Charlie, who is no longer singing words, but hoarsely ooh-ing his way up a scale that he will later argue is to show off his vocal range.

“This is a five hour VHS tape Charlie!” Mac wails in disbelief. “Why would you make a _five_ _hour_ audition tape for _the_ goddamn _Voice_?”

Charlie bears his teeth in what he hopes is a conciliatory smile, but looks more like someone being forced to grin at gunpoint, and shrugs. “Just being thorough?”

“Being thorough?” Mac repeats. “Being _thorough_?!” His eyes are wide open, arms outstretched, and for some reason, this response seems to be the thing that gives him that final shove off the deep-end.

“Charlie, you are delusional! You think you can get on _the Voice_? Maybe if it was _the Voice of a Man Getting Stabbed in the Balls_ you would stand a chance!”

Charlie’s forced smile drops, and he frowns, hurt.

“You can’t sing Charlie! You are terrible!”

Charlie’s brow furrows even more, and he can feel the beginnings of a lump in his throat.

“Your songs are disturbing! And that video is _fucking_ _insane_! They would not let you within 500 feet of Blake Shelton after seeing that, never mind put you on TV. This is what I love about you people, you all said I was the one living in a fantasy world, pretending to be something I’m not, and look at you! Think you’re going to get on TV... This is like, you know when dudes kidnap women and keep them in underground bunkers for decades and the police go in and the guy’s dressed in a human-skin suit and smearing shit all over himself? This video is the sort of thing they find in those bunkers, Charlie.”

Mac makes his way over to the video player and jabs at it with his finger. There’s a high-pitched bleep and the machine whirs as the tape is ejected. Charlie’s throat burns and his eyes feel wetter than normal. He rubs at one with the heel of his hand.

Mac lifts the flap on top of the VHS and Charlie goes to say something to stop him, but then he remembers what Mac just said and refrains.

“I’m doing you a favour buddy,” Mac says, and begins pulling the shiny black tape from the spools inside the VHS casing. “I'm just helping you face facts so you don't make a fool of yourself in front of anyone else!”

Mac grabs at the tape, grinning maniacally.

“And for fuck’s sake, _learn_ to fucking _read_.”

 

***

 

“And I was all, ‘Nooo Mac, please! Why? Whyyyy!?’”

Charlie is holding the plastic tape case high-up in one hand and dragging the other through the tangled black ribbon, fingers like claws, re-enacting Mac’s violation of his precious video. He finally clutches the VHS to his chest, eyes screwed shut, and releases a beleaguered sigh.

Dennis inhales sharply. “OK! Good, very dramatic, very…” he trails off, with a wave of his hands. Dee shakes her head, and blinks as if waking from a trance, while Frank watches Charlie warily, lips sealed tight, arms crossed over his stomach.

Charlie is trying to re-wind the tape back into its casing, disregarding the copious amounts of large knotting, and several definite loose ends. “I’m fixing it though, see? I can fix it.”

Dennis gestures for Charlie to hand him the VHS, the spine of which is indeed emblazoned with the words “DANCE MOMS 2” in Dee’s fat, bubbly writing. “C’mere, I know how to fix it.”

Charlie surrenders the video reluctantly, and Dennis picks up the waste basket from the floor next to his chair and drops the tape straight in, in one fluid motion.

“There you go.”

Dennis returns the trash can to the floor, and Charlie just stares, apparently unable to process this turn of events, so Dennis continues. “That was very entertaining, but I think you forgot to answer the one question I had, which was _why should I give a shit._ ”

“Dennis, thing is, that was a bad example,” Frank pipes up, still eyeing Charlie. “Of how this Mac problem is an issue for everyone – even you.”

“I don’t even think Mac over-reacted to Charlie,” Dee offers Dennis, conspiratorially. “I was in the bar while Charlie was recording at least part of that tape, and I was pretty damn near to busting heads when he started with those goddamn scales. I’m talking _this close,_ ” she holds her forefinger and thumb a fraction of an inch apart in illustration, “to breaking one of the optics over his fingers and shoving my fist down his throat… Coulda pulled those vocal cords out like Mac did to that tape!”

Dennis wrinkles his nose.

“And when I found out he’d taped over my _Dance Moms_ …” She laughs, a sliver of hysteria in her voice. “Oh man, when I found that out! I was… mm! I was mad.” Frank’s uneasy gaze has moved to Dee. She places both hands on her hips.

“ _Boy_ was I mad!” she continues, really starting to warm up to her anger. “I taped every single one of those shows, and I loved them. Mac hasn’t even been watching it that long, and he has the goddamn cheek to go batshit about it? I think he only got into it coz there’s like no temptation there. Everyone's a middle- aged woman or a kid. He’s watched up to Season 2? Big deal! I mean, come on! I've watched and loved _every goddamn episode_. All those stupid bitch moms, and those bratty little shits. They can’t even dance that well! And they’re not cute either. Some of them? They’re downright _ugly_.” She stops, suddenly aware of how screechy she’s gotten. Her mother’s voice echoes in her head: _‘no man wants to marry a parrot, Deandra.’_

Dennis, however, appears non-plussed.

“Well. This is just reinforcing my view that you’re a judgemental bitch, Dee; and I already knew Charlie’s crazy and Mac’s a barely functioning rage-aholic, so what now?” Dennis asks. “Any more revelations you’d like to impart that might help me to understand how Mac pissing all of you off is somehow _anything_ to do with me?”

Frank looks him straight in the eye.

“How about the fact that if you ain’t careful, Dennis, you’re gonna be drowning in a flood of Mac-feelings faster than you can say ‘nervous breakdown’?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's part one! Part two should be arriving sometime soon although I wouldn't hold your breath coz I'm slow and disorganised. 
> 
> Title is from Closer by Nine Inch Nails (fingernails or normal nails? Research is currently being done)
> 
> This is a bit of a calm before the storm and then it reaches Peak Sexy (just kidding i don't do sexy and i have no idea where this is all going! Im as in the dark as you.)
> 
> Please like / comment / throw another dart at the picture of me you have on your wall.


	6. You Let Me Complicate You: Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More stupidity.

_Two days earlier – Mac vs Frank: The Crying Game_

 

 

“C’mon baby, I’ll pay you double!”

Southern-fried sugar oozes out the cell phone against Frank’s ear. “Awwww sweetie pie, ah wish ah could come see ya, but ah got an appointment with Pepper Jack an’ he don’t much like to be left waitin’! How ‘bout lil ol' Amber comes see you nice an’ early on Friday’n we make a night of it honeybunch? Ah’ll do that thing you like... with the zucchini?” There’s a playful flirtiness to the woman’s voice, but Frank knows it’s just good customer service. He’s a businessman, he knows how to play with the best of ‘em. Whether you’re selling stocks or property or pussy, it’s all basically the same.

“Graah, sure, sure. It’s a date,” he grumbles, already flipping through his mental rolodex, trying to think of any other whores that might be free at this short notice. Zoey’s always booked up way in advance, Sasha too. There was Gina, but she’d been kind of a bummer lately. Guess losing your foot to diabetes does that to a person.

The disembodied voice is still talking.

“Yeah, yeah, yep, no, I’ll give you a call Amber, yeah, now you go see Pepper Jack, ok,” Frank removes the phone from his ear and pokes the disconnect button with his stubby finger.

“Hey! Hey, Mac!” he calls to the person slumped over at the bar, as he makes his way over to them. “Hey!” He says again, louder this time, and grabs hold of Mac’s bare arm.

“Huh? Wha-? Wha’ the fu-,“ Mac jumps, sitting up suddenly, and twists his torso so he’s looking in Frank's direction. “Jesus Frank, you scared me, man.” He blinks blearily and rubs his eyes. “Whass the time?”

“11:30! Time to go to the strip club!” Frank answers, trying to shepherd Mac off his seat and towards the door. “You been asleep for the last hour, wake up and let’s have some fun!”

“But Frank, I _can’t_ , as a gay man…” Mac starts to say, but Frank is pushing at his side, so he slides off the stool to his feet, one ankle folding under him briefly. Frank flinches at the sight, but Mac appears not to even notice. He steadies himself on the bar with one hand and grabs Frank with the other. “Where’s Dennis?”

“Dennis had to go to North Dakota, Mac, remember?” Frank intones slowly, freeing himself from Mac’s grip. “He had to go an’ see Brian Junior, and that’s why ya been slammin’ tequila for three hours,” he continues, like he’s talking to the world’s biggest, drunkest, child.

Mac makes a moaning noise. “Frank, I’m _soooo tiiiired_ ,” he whines, and his shoulders droop. He starts to drop slowly towards the floor, still hanging off the bar. “Imma lie down real quick.”

“Nope, no, noooooo.” Frank gets behind him, jamming his hands under Mac’s armpits, and tries to lift. “Holy shit you’re heavy,” Frank wheezes, and his mouth gets filled with hair as Mac's head lolls back towards his face.

“Are you sayin’ I’m fat Frank? Coz I’m not fat, I’m cul- culvitating mass. ‘M gonna get even more bigger n’ find myself a hot beefcake boyfriend and then I’m gonna rub it in Dennis’ face” Mac murmurs, still heading down towards the grubby parquet.

Frank tries in vain to blow Mac’s hair out of his mouth. “Lpppt lpt well ffffhhh fhhhh-“ He jerks his head away from Mac's so that only a few strands of hair remain on his tongue. “You ain’t gonna find yourself a boyfriend hangin’ round here,” Frank eventually gets out, and Mac stops moving, as if considering the notion. They’re both frozen, Frank’s hands still wedged under Mac’s arms, with Mac kneeling on one leg, the other stretched out in front of him.

“I know what you need,” Frank says, “how’s about we invite Molly to this party, eh?”

He feels, rather than sees, Mac’s shrug, and that’s all the encouragement he requires.

Frank quickly removes his hands, causing Mac to rock backwards with an “Oop!” and a high-pitched giggle. Mac remains on the floor, unmoving, until Frank returns, tapping out a line of yellowy looking powder on the back of his tanned, wrinkly hand.

“Here ya’ go” Frank says, thrusting his fist towards Mac’s face and offering him a shortened straw from the bar with the other. “Give your nose a treat.”

“Mmkay, maybe jus' a little bump won’t hurt...” Mac says, taking the proffered plastic tube. It takes a couple of goes (his hand eye co-ordination has gone to shit) but eventually the line disappears. Mac sniffs exaggeratedly a couple of times.

“Ack! Jesus, Frank, that tastes like shit," he complains, running a hand under his nostrils and gagging a little. Frank is too busy doing a haiku-worth of powder off the bar to reply. He straightens up, wiggling his nose and stretching his mouth wide.

“Wooo! Gotta love me that Oriental poetry,” Frank whoops. “Ok, I'm gonna order a cab, you wait here.”

All he receives in response is a quiet snore from where Mac is still slumped.

~~~

When the cab driver arrives, Frank has to pay the guy $20 to have him half carry, half drag Mac to the car, and then another $100 as a “vomit deposit" because the driver thinks Mac’s going to puke everywhere and wants the cleaning fee up front. Frank protests, but pays him, and by the time they get to the block where the Show & Tel is, Mac's sat up (kind of) on the back seat and looking around, confused.

They pull up out front, and Mac stares at the gaudy neon of the club, diffracted through the raindrops on the window pane, shining like the inside of a kaleidoscope. “Pretty,” he breathes, pressing his forehead against the cool glass.

Frank meanwhile is arguing with the cabbie about the meaning of the word “deposit”. Not only is he refusing to give the $100 back, but also demanding an extra $22.75 for the fare.

“But he didn’t throw up, you goddamn idiot!” Frank shouts.

The driver just shrugs - “Sounds like a you problem to me, little man. Now, you gonna pay me for the ride, or we gonna have some trouble?”

Frank goes to open the door, but the driver presses the automatic-lock button before he can get to the handle.

“You gonna pay,” the driver says again, slowly, “or is there gonna be some trouble?” He lifts his dirty, graying t-shirt to reveal the handle of a 9mm peeking from the waistband of his jeans.

Frank sighs, more irritated than threatened, and says, “Mac, you seeing this shit?” He glimpses over to the back seat to find Mac tracing the path of a raindrop down the window with his finger, too blasted to appreciate the situation.

“Jesus Christ.” Frank reaches into his pocket. “You got change for a $50?”

“Nope,” the driver smiles, popping the ‘p', and Frank wishes he’d brought his piece, or at least someone who could help him beat the shit out of this guy. Mac is worse than useless.

“Well, there you go then I guess, you fuck,” Frank says, handing the guy the crumpled fifty.

“Pleasure doing business with you,” the driver says, still grinning, and Frank could cheerfully slit his throat.

“Come on Mac,” Frank says. The doors are unlocked, and Frank’s clambering out the passenger side, onto the uneven asphalt of the Show & Tel parking lot. Mac climbs out too, shutting the rear door behind him and wiping his hand through the droplets on the window, smears of blood reds and lush purples, electric blues and sparkling gold left in the wake of his palm.

“ _Fuck_ _you_ _very much!”_ Frank says angrily into the cab, before slamming his door shut and flipping the bird as the car drives off, tires screeching on the tarmac.

“Lot of goddamn use you are!” Frank shouts, twisting on one foot to face Mac. “That’s the most expensive cab-ride I ever took! I better get some pussy in this place, I swear to God.”

“I think you will, Frank, I think any guy with a dollar stickin’ out his fly could prolly get pussy here,” Mac says, grimacing at the building in front of them.

“Oh, _now_ you perk up! Two minutes ago you were drooling on yourself like a coma patient but now you’re awake enough for a witty goddamn quip. Jesus. I am not payin’ your cover charge in here, you son of a bitch,” Frank grouses and heads to the door of the club. (In all honestly, yeah, the Show & Tel is a real shithole, but he’s been banned from that many strip joints he’s gone beyond the bottom of the barrel and is scraping away at the dirt beneath.)

As it turns out, there isn’t a cover charge on Tuesday nights. Mac smiles happily when they’re told.

Frank, however, groans, and when Mac looks at him questioningly, he opines: “No cover charge means the worst girls. You’re talkin’ track marks, prison tattoos and caesarean scars out the wazoo!”

Despite Frank's complaining, they get themselves drinks, and seats at a table near the stage, upon which a woman with a sparkly eye patch is gyrating round a pole to some generic dance track. Frank has to hand it to her though, she’s doing pretty good considering the lack of depth perception, and her rack ain’t bad either.

“Why did you bring me here, Frank” Mac half-shouts over the music. “You don’t usually wanna spend time with me.” The molly must have taken full effect – he’s practically back to normal now, if still slurring a little.

Frank groans, but Mac doesn’t hear over the thumping bass. “Just thought we could have a good time, y’know, I erm, I feel like we got this er connection an’ all since seein’ ya... ehhh.... _thing_ at the prison,” Frank says, his eyes not leaving the woman on the stage. He hopes that’s gay and fluffy enough to satisfy the other man and end the conversation.

Mac’s eyes flash. “Really? You really think that?” he asks, and when Frank turns his head, Mac's looking at him like an eager puppy. Frank wants to put him in a sack with some rocks and throw him in the Schuylkill river.

“Sure!” he replies instead, focus back on the dancer. “Why not.” He takes a big gulp of his drink and hisses at the burn as it hits his throat.

“Wow! That’s so nice of you,” Mac says, a huge grin on his face, and he seems genuinely touched. Frank doesn’t have the heart to tell him that the real reason he dragged him along to the club was desperation: Dennis is in North Dakota, Charlie had some “Waitress shit” to deal with, Pondy’s got an ankle monitor and a 9pm curfew… Mac just happens to be the only person available to hang with.

Which isn’t to say he didn’t feel something that day at the prison. He knew what it was like to be a misfit and an outcast. To be unwanted, and a freak, and to know that even the people who should love you didn’t. Barbara never loved him, Dennis and Deandra didn’t love him… Some might say that was his fault, but fuck them. They didn’t know how hard it was being a frog kid, a nitwit. They didn’t know what that shit did to a person.

Mac’s a misfit too. Not hard enough to follow in his dad’s criminal footsteps, but too white trash to make something of himself. Too scared to be tough, too weak to be a leader, too quick to fuck someone over if it means saving his own skin. And, perhaps worst of all in his dad’s eyes, too sentimental, too quick to fall in love, too much of a slave to his boisterous and unmanageable emotions.

But while Frank’s grown a tough skin coz of his outsider status, Mac hasn't, or simply isn’t able. Frank doesn't give a fuck anymore, _can't_ give a fuck anymore, whereas Mac’s an exposed nerve. He’s needy. Frank could tell that from day one. Mac needs approval from people to be alright with himself, whether it’s from his mom or dad, or Dennis, or Charlie, or God.

Yet to his credit, he’d gone out there and laid himself bare in front of Luther – the person he most tried to emulate - and exposed part of himself he thought he’d be disowned for.  He was brave enough to say “this is me” to someone who could so easily decide they didn't want to know. Frank had to respect a person who could make themselves so vulnerable and raw; and when Luther had walked out... Frank had felt that deep in his bones. It felt like every rejection he'd ever known, and more.

When it was all over, Frank waited for Mac at the front of the prison.

When he'd finally come outside, his dance partner having left almost an hour earlier, Mac’s eyes were still bloodshot and raw, and it looked like he'd aged 10 years in one afternoon. His face was gaunt, flesh drawn tight over tired bones that threatened to pierce papery skin. He looked like he'd lost something, and Frank realised: it was hope. There was nothing left to hope for. It was out - _he_ was out - there was no way to hide. It was done, and his dad had abandoned him. Before, either outcome was possible. It was like Schrödinger’s cat in its box, neither a positive nor a negative, but an intangible concept just floating there, nebulous and forever changing, both everything and nothing all at once. Sure, the lid didn’t have holes in, and there’d been no miaowing for some time, so things didn’t _look_ great, but there’d always been that slim chance it’d be ok. Then Mac had opened up, and there was the cat, dead as disco, and Mac's dad had left, and there was nothing more to say.

Mac had smiled when he saw Frank, a mimicry of warmth that didn't reach as far as his eyes. In response, Frank had opened his arms and embraced Mac with an affection he'd not given or received for a long time.

At first Mac seemed startled, stiffening at the strange newness, but then his guard came down and he'd dropped his gym bag to the floor and wrapped himself around Frank with reciprocated enthusiasm. They stood there for what felt like hours, Mac occasionally letting out deep, shuddery sighs. Frank had eventually pulled away with the manliest cough he could manage, after he overheard a passing woman comment, “Aw ain’t that romantic, he's been waiting for his boyfriend while he's been in prison.”

Neither he nor Mac had mentioned it since; and that’s just how Frank likes it.

“Y’know Frank, I never said thanks for being there for me that day an’ everything,” Mac says. He’s covered in a thin sheen of sweat, even though the club has its AC blasting. “But that hug, dude! It meant everything to me.”

Frank purses his lips distastefully, and Mac drains his drink. “Yeah, sure,” Franks says, fingering the straw in his glass. “Not a problem”. He flags a waitress, and a tiny blonde totters over on perspex heels, wearing nothing but mismatched lace underwear. Frank orders another couple tumblers of whiskey, and considers if MDMA was the best thing to give Mac. He doesn't shut up at the best of times.

Mac’s running one of his hands back and forth over his thigh, nervous, or more likely totally wired.

“Nah man, don’t minimise it dude, I don’t think you realise, that was so huge! Massive! Coz I know you aren’t fulla shit like people are sometimes. So it meant somethin’. You don’t pretend to give a fuck, but I felt like you really gave a fuck about me that day, y’know? Coulda been bullshit but it didn’t feel like it! I never saw you even give as much a fuck about Dennis before, not that I could remember, y’know?” Mac’s got the hand that’s not rubbing his leg over his mouth, trying to direct his voice toward Frank, talking at top volume over the pulsing music, but not taking his eyes off the woman dancing.

“What color s'that thong d’you reckon?” he says suddenly, and Frank jerks his head towards him, wondering where the fuck this could be going. “It’s nice! Nice tone to it. I’m thinkin’ of re-painting my room, you know, it's been gray for that long, s’time to move on! Time to change it up a bit! As a gay man, I need to start taking more interest in interior design and fashion. What color is it, maybe a kinda blue?”

“That ain't blue,” Frank interjects, slightly incredulous. “It’s purple.”

Mac cocks his head, squints.

“You sure? Looks kinda blue to me. Maybe if I get a photo of it I can take it to Home Depot and just have ‘em match it up.”

Mac removes his phone from his pocket and turns the camera on, right as the waitress is returning with their drinks.

“No photos,” she says, smacking her gum while she puts the squat glasses of nicotine-hued liquid on the table.

Mac looks around to see who she could be talking to. He presses a hand to his chest. “Me?”

The girl stares at him. “Yes, you, you're the one taking photos, are you not?”

“Ohhh! Oh yeah, I was, but it’s ok.”

There’s a blank look in response.

“Coz I’m gay, see? The photo’s for interior decor related purposes only, I promise. It wouldn't be for any sexual gratification" (this comes out more like ‘sekshul grafikitation', suggesting to Frank that Mac has sobered up less than he originally thought). “No offense ma'am, but women's bodies are gross. To me, anyway! Like, take Frank here, I’m sure Frank would plow you to kingdom come.”

The waitress glances at the smaller of the two men, who waggles his thick caterpillar eyebrows to confirm that he would, indeed, plow the shit out of her given half the chance.

“But for me, you’re too tiny and weedy.” Mac motions to the girl’s thin, pale arm. “Look at that twiggy little thing! What am I gonna do with that? Is that gonna make me feel all safe and protected? No way! And I don't wanna get too personal, but that downstairs situation is all jacked up. It’s like... an angry ham sandwich.”

The waitress has stopped chewing, and Frank holds his breath. He’s seen people get ejected from strip clubs for far less. Mac pauses for a beat.

“I should clarify. I didn't mean _your_ downstairs was all jacked up. I meant _all_ women's downstairs areas are. Yours included.”

The girl laughs, loud and genuine.  “As someone who sees their fair share of pussy, I would have to agree. Give me a dick any day.”

Mac nods enthusiastically.

“But still no photos I’m afraid sir, gay or no. It’s against company policy, so put your phone away, ok hon?” And with that she’s gone.

“Shit, that sucks. I mean, I’m totally gonna take some anyway but now I’m gonna have to be all stealth and shit.”

Mac stands and extends his arms out straight in front of him like he’s stretching, and makes a loud “eeeehhhhh” noise, snapping a photo at the same time. The flash goes off, a bolt of white light, and Frank sees the burly security guy stood by the door look sharply in their direction.

“For chrissakes” Frank says, grabbing a fistful of Mac’s shirt and pulling him back down into his seat. “You’re gonna get us kicked outta here if you don’t cut it out.” He watches the doorman out of the corner of his eye, while Mac inspects his phone.

“Damn, it’s blurred. You can kinda see it though. I mean, it’s mainly her ass, but.. whadda you think?” Mac asks, holding his phone inches from Frank’s face. “D’you think Home Depot can work with that?”

Frank bats Mac’s hand away from him and growls, “Brraaarghhh! How the hell should I know if Home goddamn Depot can match colors from pictures of a stripper's shitter? What I do know is you’re actin’ like an asshole, an’ if you don’t cool it, that hunk of meat working the door is gonna stick his foot in your ass.”

Mac looks back toward the entrance to the club, eyebrows raised.

“Not in a good way!” Frank adds, before Mac gets any ideas, but he’s already distracted, checking the guy out with a lascivious look, the thong apparently all but forgotten.

Frank clicks his fingers, inches from Mac’s face, causing him to flinch, eyelids fluttering.

“Huh?” Mac struggles to focus, his addled brain finding the barrage of aural and visual stimulation hard to keep up with. “What were we talkin’ about?” He turns round to the stage again, and picks up his drink, taking a long sip.

Frank’s about to point out that _we_ weren’t talking about anything, he was just getting talked _at_ , but Mac pipes up again, “I remember!” and drops his glass down to the table with a clunk. “We were talking about the thing at the prison!”

Frank sighs heavily and decides to just tune him out and focus on tits. Do that thing like when you relax your eyes and everything goes fuzzy. That, but with your ears.

Unfortunately, Mac’s voice cuts through the air like machinery through a Vietnamese kid’s hand.

“Yeah, so, like I was saying. The point is that I ‘preciate it. I ‘preciate _you_ , Frank. I shoulda said sooner. God, you must think I’m a real dick, huh?”

He takes another gulp of his drink.

“Some people don't appreciate you the way I do though. I don't wanna be a rat, but Dennis has always been real disparaging about you, y’know. Said you were a shitty dad, and a shitty person, and like, a shitty, corrupt businessman... and just a weird horrible ugly little guy...”

Frank stares daggers at him, but Mac continues, oblivious.

“Even when we were young, Dennis would always be whining. “Waaah, my dad gave my Christmas presents away, my dad makes me and Dee fight each other for money, my dad tried to pimp me out to a potential investor....”

“He was of age!” Frank cuts in, “No one was interested in Dee coz of that junky back brace, so I had to improvise. Nothin' ever happened anyway!”

“Totally!” Mac says, “Boo fuckin hoo, Dennis. Your dad thought you were sexy enough that middle-aged businessmen might want to fuck you. Sounds like a compliment to me! And like, least you were there for him, y'know what I mean? You were around.”

Frank’s mouth twitches and he sticks his bottom lip out, considering.

“I was there when I wasn’t not there, yeah. You’re right! Dennis is an ungrateful punk.”

“He is! He doesn’t know how damn lucky he is! You’ve looked after him, I’ve looked after him, both of us have been there, and made sure he’s ok, right?”

Frank is nodding along in agreement. “Calls me ugly? And _little_? The hell.”

“Right? He called _me_ ugly too, and he fucking took off with _Mandy_ and _Brian Junior_ like they’re so goddamn important. Where was Mandy the time he got that bad haircut and needed someone to start wearing hats so he wouldn’t stand out? Huh? I wore a goddamn woolly hat through the hottest July in decades, until his hair grew back. And where was Brian Junior when Maureen dumped him the first time round, and he cried for three days and said he was going to kill himself coz he was gonna die alone? It was awful! He was so annoying, Frank! He wouldn’t shut up about her!”

Frank shakes his head sympathetically, and Mac sits up straighter in his chair, head high. He slaps his palm on to the tabletop, the ice in their drinks jingling.

“And for what? Whass Dennis Reynolds ever done to deserve our unwavering love and dedication?”

Frank pulls a face. He’s not sure he’s ever given Dennis _that_. But Mac seems to be operating under the impression that Frank’s some kind of Super Dad, so who’s he to argue. Maybe he’s a great father and he just never realised before.

Mac huffs.

“Y’know, all I’ve ever done’s been for other people. An’ all he ever does is for himself.”

The words come out like bullets. Mac’s face has darkened, a shadow fallen over it, and he grinds his teeth. Frank carries on watching the one-eyed dancer, but checks back on Mac periodically. Charlie had told him the situation with the video the day before, and how Mac had gone schizoid over some TV show about a guy called Dan and a buncha kids. He figured it was Charlie being typically melodramatic, but Frank was used to angry Mac, and this was a seething rage he's not seen before. He’s borderline nut-bar. Frank wonders if it’s a natural reaction to not jerking-off. Seems a little extreme, but what does he know?

“The point is, that you were there for him then, and you’re there for him now. Where’s my dad at? Where’s he been all my life? Why does Dennis get you, an’ I get… nothing?” Mac’s voice cracks, and Frank looks over at him, horrified. If he turns on the waterworks Frank doesn’t know what he’ll do.

Mac carries on, eyes huge and glassy, the flashing strobe lights sparkling in the jet black of his dilated pupils.

“Y’know, I tried so hard to make my dad proud, and I could never do it. I never could. And now I never will.”

Frank glances back to Mac, scared to look, just as a fat tear rolls down his cheek.

“Oh Jesus,” Frank says.

“What did I do? What did I do wrong?” Mac laments, and he’s really crying now. Frank searches around the club nervously, half hoping no-one’s noticed Mac’s having some kind of breakdown, the other half desperately praying that someone, preferably female, will come and deal with the blubbering jumble of emotions next to him.

Unsure of what else to do, Frank moves his chair a little closer to Mac, and pats him gingerly on the shoulder. Even the dancer seems momentarily distracted, apparently able to hear Mac’s bawling over the music, and nearly trips as she kicks her thong off and over to the back of the stage.

“There, there” Frank says, still patting and looking round the room, face fraught with perturbation.

“Why couldn’t you have been my dad Frank? It’s so unfair! I’m like the only one of the gang whose dad you definitely aren’t.”

Frank thanks God, but says nothing.

“That hug, that’s like… you know, it’s like the only time I can remember a guy showing me affection that wasn’t sexual?”

Frank shifts, uncomfortable, in his chair.

“Not that I’ve got much experience there either,” Mac says, looking down into his drink, and his face scrunches up again. “I’m a fucking loser, Frank! I was no good at being straight, and I’m no good at being gay, and I’m certainly no good at being a son.”

Mac’s shoulders start heaving up and down, sobs racking his whole body, and Frank cringes.

“Mac, buddy, c'mon, it ain't all that bad,” Frank keeps his voice low, but gets as near to Mac as he can so he can hear him. “You ain’t a bad gay. You weren’t great at being hetero, I’ll give ya that, but that’s just coz you ain’t! You don’t get mad at a fish coz he can’t fly, do ya?”

Mac hiccups, and shakes his head, so Frank carries on.

“Your dad, he’s what they call a primo dirtbag, ok? He don't give a shit about no-one, and there ain’t nothing you can do ‘bout that. Your pop's like a diaper on an abandoned kid. Fulla shit, and not gonna get to changing any time soon; and the faster you come to terms with that, the better.”

Mac swallows thickly, and Frank is relieved to find his crying has calmed to a pathetic sniffle.

“You’re right, you're right,” Mac says loudly, apparently less concerned than Frank about sharing their conversation with the bar’s other patrons. “I can't make him care. I jus' gotta be grateful for what I _do_ have, like my mom.”

Frank looks at him, skeptical. He's not entirely sure if Mac might be being ironic.

“Mom's an angel, raised me pretty much all on her own. She’s been there all along, always encouraging me, always giving me advice and support... I’ve got her.”

Frank nods, “Absolutely, your mom’s a real diamond.”

“And I got you, right Frank?” Mac adds, the desperate puppy look back and pitiful as ever. “I’m sorry for getting all mushy and shit, I'm just... I’m a bit fucked in the head recently, I don't know if I'm coming or going.”

Frank nearly pitches in with “I heard you definitely weren’t coming,” but decides against it. No need to kick him while he's down.

“And you know, I stand by it. Your being there that day – it made one of the worst days of my life a little bit less suck-filled.”

Mac goes on, loud as ever, just as the music comes to a dramatic crescendo and the stripper, wearing nothing but six inch heels and a rhinestone eye patch, does her big finish, suspended upside down, legs spread eagle and fake tits like two flesh covered beach balls, defying the laws of gravity as they rest immobile on either side of the shiny pole.

Then there's abrupt silence, save for Mac’s stupid voice, practically echoing round the large club, with its mercifully few other customers.

“...thank you coz I’ve never had a man touch me so deep before. You really got inside me, Frank; and you penetrated parts of me I didn't think anyone could ever reach.”

The stripper dismounts the pole, giving both men a withering look, while Frank frantically addresses the room.

“He means emotionally! Emotional penetration! No dicks involved ha ha!”

The two men sitting at the opposite side of the stage seem disinterested. Someone coughs.

“I ain’t gay, in fact it was my idea to go to this club,” Frank adds, trying to spot a reaction from anyone in the place. The waitress who served them earlier looks on, a smirk on her lips, while Mac just appears confused.

‘ _A big hand for Kylie there on the pole, thanks Kylie’_ says a man's voice over the sound system as the stripper gives a small bow, before picking up her discarded clothing and exiting the stage via a gold lame curtain at the rear.

_‘_ _If you wanna know how to spell Kylie, just remember it’s with one “i".’_

There's a pause and a crackle.

_‘Coming up in a half hour we have the inimitable talents of Sienna, the Show and Tel's ping pong champion! But that isn't a paddle she's usin'..... So stick around for good times, you're sure to have a ball!’_

The mic crackles again and another shitty dance track begins.

Everybody continues with whatever they’d been doing prior to Mac’s inadvertent announcement.

“Shit Frank, I jus' realised that that sounded kinda bad. You want me to tell the waitress you're not queer? She looked like she might be up for bangin' when it got mentioned before, could be worth a try?” He looks genuinely concerned, and Frank feels his embarrassment and anger subside a little.

“Nah, it's ok. You know though, I know I didn't raise ya, and you ain't my flesh and blood, but we went on Family Fight together, and goddamn if I ain't proud to be your stand-in daddy,” Frank says with a serene smile.

“You're a good kid, Mac.”

Mac’s face splits into a broad grin, eyes crinkling at the corners, tear tracks forgotten.

“Can I?”

He holds his arms out wide and Frank leans across the side of his chair to respond with a firm embrace.

They stay like that for a while.

Frank isn't one for mawkish bullshit, but he has to admit that Mac’s belief in him as a father figure is nice. Makes him feel like less of a shitheel. And the guy’s a good hugger.

Mac is resting his head against Frank’s shoulder, eyes closed, right hand stroking across the plain of the smaller man's back. It feels _so_ _good_. Frank's shirt must be made of silk or something, and he smells surprisingly amazing, like leather-bound books, and fresh sweat, and whiskey, and all that other great manly stuff.

Mac sighs gently and Frank pulls away from the embrace, but Mac’s hands are still at his shoulders, caressing the silky fabric, and he looks into Frank’s eyes, and Frank looks back anxiously.

Then Mac moves forward and kisses him, eyes closed and lips ever so slightly parted, and Frank tastes salt from where Mac’s been crying and Mac licks softly at Frank’s mouth -

***

“Bullshit Frank! You can't just make shit up!” Dennis exclaims, interrupting Frank’s tale. “Do you really expect me to believe that _Mac_ kissed _you_?”

Dennis looks from Frank, to Dee, to Charlie, and back to Frank again. None of them are smiling, or laughing, not a wry smirk or a nudge between them.

Frank's face is a slab of granite, and he looks deadly serious.

“I'm deadly serious, Dennis,” Frank says, and Dennis’ expression goes from incredulity to disgust, through anger, and finally settles on a pallid nausea. He feels like he might vomit, and his throat contracts. Sweat prickles under his arms and his mouth goes dry.

“Did you... er... did you fuck him?” Dennis asks, his voice tight, like it physically hurts him to say the words. He can’t bring himself to look at Frank’s face.

“No!” Frank explodes, “Of course I didn’t fuck him you idiot! Look -" Frank gets his phone out and after a couple of minutes of prodding at the screen, he passes the handset to Dennis, a text displayed in large font.

_Frank please dont tell anyone about last nite. I’m sorry itried  to kiss u. It was wrong. I think im sick rite now. Plz plz dont tell Demos. im begging you._

Dennis feels his heart rate returning to normal, and he breathes in and out deeply, nostrils flared. He forces his face back to a neutral mask of indifference, but he twitches a little in spite of himself.

“Demos?” he asks, chin high.

Frank shrugs. “Autocorrect.”

Dennis stares at the phone, thinking. On the one hand, Mac’s been annoying and angry and sleep-deprived and incompetent and pathetically, _painfully_ horny since he gave up rubbing it out. On the other, what else is new? He’s just a bit more “turned up to 11” with all that unspent juice clouding his judgement. He'd smashed a few more things, been a bit more clingy, sat uncomfortably close on a few more occasions, but it was a small price to pay for a live-in car cleaner / movie buddy / general dogsbody. Probably the worst thing about the whole situation was the amount of chick flicks they were having to watch, coz of Mac finding action movies (or the people in them) too stimulating.

Charlie, Dee, and Frank watch him expectantly.

Dennis hands the phone back.

“Yeah. I mean that’s vile, but I still don't care.”

Frank rolls his eyes and Charlie turns away with a sigh, disappointed. Dee makes a frustrated noise and steps forward, leaning over the desk into Dennis' face.

“Look, _Dennis_ ” she sneers, eyes blazing. “You obviously don’t give a fuck about Charlie, and you apparently don't even care that Mac tried to go two for two on banging the people who raised us, but his negligence is gonna end up with us in deep shit if you're not careful. I’m talking jail time, and you won’t last in prison, Dennis. I know it, and you _definitely_ know it. So unless you want to be some big dumb redneck’s bitch, you better listen up, and listen good...” 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will Dennis ever give a shit? Will Frank realise he's not 6' 3"? Will Dee actually rip Charlie's larynx out? And will Charlie ever get on the Voice?
> 
> Stay tuned for more bullshit, coming (probably not) soon to an AO3 near you.
> 
> PS Thank you to OystersAintForMe who created the pic for my tumblr hawking, not that anyone will see it. If you haven't already, read her fic coz she's tonnes better than me.


	7. You Let Me Complicate You: Part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ridiculousness

_Six Hours Earlier – Mac vs Dee: Beware the ID's of March_

Dee enters Paddy’s, accompanied by an icy gust of March weather. She brushes her hair out of her face and starts to remove her jacket.

“Goddamn it’s windy out there,” she remarks to no-one in particular. The bar is dead. It’s no surprise. It always is, especially at 12:15 on a Thursday afternoon. They’ve only been open about an hour, and there’s just the usual couple of sad-looking bar flies pickling their livers in the booth closest the bathrooms, and a few guys playing pool at the far end of the room. Mac, meanwhile, is stood stone-faced behind the bar, and Dee pauses when they make eye-contact. She knows she’s not Mac’s favorite person, that much is crystal clear, but he’s looking at her like she shit in his cereal. She raises her eyebrows questioningly.

“Jesus Christ Dee! Why don’t you take a bit longer to get your ass over here?” Mac erupts, slamming his half drunk Coors onto the counter. The liquid inside bubbles up and over the rim of the bottle, down onto his hand. He doesn’t seem to notice. “You’re already late, you may as well be another twenty minutes taking your coat off! Which, I might add, is fucking heinous.”

Dee sneers in response, and starts folding her now removed pastel pink bomber jacket, movements deliberately, excruciatingly sloth-like.

“Really, bitch?” Mac says snottily. “You sure you wanna take so long? Coz the local amateur production of Grease called and they want their costume back, Rizzo."

Dee pretends to be fascinated by a snag on her sleeve, and makes no attempt to relieve Mac of his drinks-serving duties. She was supposed to start at 12, with Mac only covering bar till then, coz he sucked at dealing with customers and whinged about it the whole time, but Dee likes to make him suffer. The guy’s an asshole, and since he came out he’s been bitchier than ever before, always commenting on her clothes like he thinks he’s on Project goddamn Runway. She wouldn’t have minded so much if he didn’t dress like the sort of ten dollar rent boy you saw hanging round down at the docks. Except much, _much_ older. She smiles to herself. What a zinger. She’ll save that one for later.

“Dee, I really need to piss!” Mac whines at her, and she thinks he stomps his foot, but it’s hard to tell when she can only see him from the torso up. He does look like he’s about to have a tantrum, however.

“You don’t need to stand there until I replace you, you thrift-store dildo, you can just go to the bathroom you know?!” she snaps back, and it genuinely appears like the thought hadn’t occurred to him.

“Yeah, well, whatever,” he mumbles, and storms towards the men’s room, muttering “Your dress sense is dogshit” under his breath as he passes.

Dee snorts. “That might mean something coming from someone who doesn’t look like a ten dollar-“ She’s cut off by the sound of the bathroom door slamming shut, and she turns to find Mac has left. Looks like it’s gonna be one of those shifts.

~~~

After getting settled behind the bar, Dee cleans up a little: empties the drip trays, throws away a few bottle caps, but she soon gets bored, and fishes a magazine out of her bag.

“Good God, another royal baby” she mutters, leaning on the bar and studying the front page of _In Touch_. “Wonder what skanky Markle will think. Ha!”

She flicks through to the story, stopping momentarily to shudder at a picture of Lindsay Lohan. All the work she's had done is beginning to make Tara Reid’s plastic surgeon look good by comparison.

“ _Princess Katherine is glowing again, and has been taking part in Mommies Yoga, with no sign of the morning sickness she suffered from previously_ ," Dee reads aloud. “Jesus I'm surprised she can fit a baby in there with you guys so far up her ass.”

An unfamiliar laugh makes her startle, and Dee finds herself looking into the bright blue eyes of one of the pool-players. He’s cute, with a shock of dark hair falling over his brow and a mischievous smile.

“I don't get why everyone loves Kate Middleton so much,” he says quietly, and Dee nods.

“Totally! She’s so bland! I guess she’s ok looking for someone from England...”

“But that's not saying much, right?” the guy interrupts, and grins.

“Right,” Dee grins back.

“She sure doesn’t look like a princess either. Princesses should look like you,” he adds, using his index finger to trace a heart shape on the beer mat in front of him. Dee’s eyes widen. “Seriously, you’re like Cinderella.”

(When recounting this for Frank and Charlie and, after them, Dennis, Dee neglects to mention that at this point she had in fact dry-retched twice and had to get herself a sip of bubbly water before continuing the conversation, and that she had also dry-retched for a third time just thinking about the whole exchange, but it wasn't important to the story, so she decided to omit that tidbit.)

“Cor blimey guv, cheers," Dee says in a British accent, and bats her eyelashes. She runs her pointer finger and thumb suggestively up and down the Coors bottle Mac left on the bar. “Maybe you could be my Prince Charming?”

Blue Eyes laughs. “Maybe... We'll have to wait for midnight to find out, I guess. How about you get me four bottles of Heineken and four tequila slammers in the meantime, huh?”

Dee gets the drinks together, aware of the guy’s eyes on her. She offers to help carry them over to his friends by the pool table, but he insists that he do it himself.

She pours out six shots, leaving two on the bar rather than on the round plastic tray with the rest of his order, and sets up lime and salt.

“How about one each? One for you.” She presses her finger into his chest, before turning it back at herself. “And one for me. It's on the house.”

Blue Eyes doesn't answer, just sprinkles salt onto the back of his hand and licks it up slowly, not breaking their occular bond the entire time. He downs the tequila in one, and places the lime between his lips.

“You go,” he says, then watches as Dee fumbles with the salt and nearly knocks over her shot, and squeezes lime juice across the bar on accident. Blue Eyes seems unruffled however, and hands over two twenty dollar bills when Dee tells him it'll be 38 bucks.

“Keep the change.” He picks up his drinks tray, and Dee forces a smile at the two dollar tip. “I’m Tanner by the way,” he adds as he starts to walk back to his friends. 

“Dee,” Dee answers, wiping up the rogue lime juice.

“For delicious, yeah?” Tanner winks, and Dee blushes a little. He might be a tightass, but he’s smooth as Skippy-brand peanut butter.

With that he's gone, returned to his three friends, and Dee decides maybe she'll mix things up a bit and stand at the other end of the bar today, a decision which is unconnected to her relative proximity to Tanner, and honestly just because she needs some variety in life, goddamn it. She picks up her magazine with one hand and nonchalantly wipes the counter down with the other, moving further and further towards the pool table.

“- bro you suck at this!” One of Tanner’s friends is saying as she approaches.

“Least I don't suck at soccer dude, seriously Coach Johnson is so gonna cut you this season,” another retorts, and the first friend pots a striped ball, easily. “Damn it!”

Tanner and the fourth guy are sat on stools and watching the other two play, both facing away from where Dee is, apparently oblivious to her presence.

“You are seriously getting your ass kicked right now, Kahn” the seated guy who isn't Tanner says.

“Fuck you, Bianchi,” Kahn shoots back, shaking his cue in his friend’s direction, but there's no real anger behind it, and his opponent takes another shot. “You're for the cut too, y'know, I heard Coach talking to Principal Howe about it.” Another stripe falls into the middle left pocket. “Are you fuckin' kidding me dude?”

Dee pauses. Coach Johnson? Principal Howard? That sounds suspiciously like high school talk.

“- you know my mom’s said I can't go away for spring break this year coz my grades are so shitty right?” Kahn is saying. “I'm definitely gonna go though. What's she gonna do, ground me?” He high fives Tanner, who laughs obnoxiously.

“Since your dad left she can't do shit to you bro, she's like... a tiny Korean lady!” Tanner guffaws. “She gonna try nagging you into not going?”

Kahn stops laughing abruptly. “Hey man, you don’t need to be racist ‘bout it.”

“Sure, sure. Sorry,” Tanner says, sheepishly.

Dee's torn. On the one hand, Tanner is really cute. Yeah, he looks young, but he's not, like, pre-pubescent. He's definitely pubescent, maybe even _post_ -pubescent. On the other hand, it sounds like he might be in high school.

 _But_ he _also_ said she looked like Cinderella.

Then again, the last time they had served underage kids, and gotten embroiled in a heap of high school drama, and actually planned on going to _prom_ for some stupid reason, they'd found one of those minors passed out in the men's bathrooms at closing time. She and Dennis had voted to leave the little shit out in the alley, make him someone else's problem, but Mac and Charlie had insisted on taking him to the hospital. He'd ended up needing his stomach pumped, and, man, were his parents pissed.

Then, the cops got involved, and it had became a whole ‘thing'. They’d been lucky enough to get away with only having to pay a fine on that occasion, but the judge had been clear: if it happened again, it was jail time. And Dee’s too pretty to go to jail. She doesn't want to spend the rest of her life making toilet wine and munching rug. Especially not prison-rug.

“Ok, ok” she blurts out, as she exits the bar, hands in the air and mind made up. “I'm gonna need to see some ID's.”

All four boys look to her, seemingly unfazed, and she notices the kid next to Tanner nudge him.

“Aw baby,” Tanner says, and jumps off his barstool to meet her halfway, Heineken still in hand. “Surely you don’t think I’m not 21?”

He’s looking at her with big round eyes, and she almost, _almost_ falls for it, until she notices Kahn is giggling at them both, his teeth encased in shiny silver braces.

“Shit, Tanner! I can't let this fly when you've got your friend sitting there like Tootie goddamn Ramsay!” she exclaims, gesturing towards Kahn, who, fuck, looks about 14 years-old. No wonder they sent Tanner to the bar. The other three don’t look old enough to shave, let alone drink.

“Who?” Tanner gives her a blank look.

“Tootie Ramsay?” Dee says again, and Tanner shrugs. “From _The Facts of Life_?”

“Are you talking ‘bout my braces, lady, coz adults get braces you know,” Kahn interjects. “Tom Cruise got ‘em.”

Dee hesitates. He’s got a point. Tom Cruise is also pretty goddamn tiny. _But_ Tom Cruise does not have acne, and a voice that’s still breaking.

“I’m sorry guys, I need to see your ID's,” she repeats, and holds her hand out.

The other kid playing pool, whose name she hasn't heard yet, pipes up – “C'mon, that's not fair! We already showed our ID's to the guy on the bar.”

Dee jerks her head towards him. “Not fair? Not fair?! I tell you what's not fair, little boy. Having to deal with this shit, when all I wanna do is chill out with a beer and some celebrity gossip, ok? So hand them goddamn over.”

Tanner rolls his eyes and pulls his wallet from his pocket. “Deandra, honey...” he says, slipping the card from its holder.

Dee pauses, eyes narrowed. “How'd you know my name, you little...” She snatches the ID and studies it. The photo’s definitely him. Name: _Tanner Pennington_ \- seems legit, if familiar somehow. Height: _5’ 9”_ – sure, weight: _140lbs_ – ok, date of birth: _14/03/1969_ – jackpot.

“So you were fifty years old a couple of weeks ago, huh?” She says, and Tanner sulks, looking at the floor. “Well, many happy returns!” She points at Kahn. “Now you.”

Kahn checks his pockets for his ID.

“And you showed these cards to the guy on the bar, right?” Dee asks.

Nameless Guy nods: “Yeah, we did, so it's not really right for you to -"

“MAAA-AAC!” Dee screams, making the four boys, and probably everyone else in the pub, jump in shock, and Tanner wince. “MAC! GET YOUR GODDAMN ASS OUT HERE!”

“What?!” Mac yells back, it sounds like from the keg room. “What the hell do you want?”

“Just come here," she shouts, as Kahn passes her his ID and avoids her eyes. “Ok, well this is a black guy,” She says, glancing at Kahn's card with brows raised. “Jesus H fucking goddamn Christ.”

Mac trudges up beside Dee, hands on his hips. “What the hell, Dee, this better be good, I was napping.”

“Well numb nuts, you managed to let a bunch of underage kids into the bar, so yeah, I think that's a pretty good reason to interrupt your nap. This one's card” she thumbs towards Tanner, “says he's fifty years-old, and _this one_ ,” she gestures at Kahn, “is apparently African-American.”

Mac shrugs. “So?”

“So?! SO?! Do you not remember our previous issues with _underage drinking_ , Mac,” Dee hisses, and Mac's eyes widen.

“Oh shit.”

“Oh shit indeed, you boner. How in God's name did you not spot that this kid is, like, 14, and _not black_?” Dee asks.

“I dunno... I mean... He's not white?” Mac answers.

“I'm fucking Korean, you stupid asshole,” Kahn scowls, and Tanner chips in with ‘that's racist, bro'.

Mac’s nostrils flare at being called stupid, and before Dee can stop him he’s behind Kahn, with the boy’s arms in a chicken-wing hold.

“Owwwww! Shit!” Kahn moans, “Pennington, do something!”

“Wait a minute,” Dee says, turning to Tanner. “ _Pennington_! I do know that name! Are you Trey's... son?”

Trey Pennington, the most popular kid in school, who’d asked her to prom and then left her for that rotten slut Tammy. The name had always stuck with her, coz Ty Pennington and Extreme Makeover had been getting big round then. Trey. Her prom king. That little dick.

“His son?” Tanner scoffs, “I’m his brother, you dense bitch. He told me that if I ever wanted to go out drinking in Philly, there was this dive bar called Paddy’s where the barmaid was so easy she nearly went to prom with him when he was 18 and she was 28. I knew it must have been you from the minute you walked through that door, judging by the stench of desperation that came in with you.”

Mac sniggers, enjoying Dee getting ripped to shreds by a high schooler, and Dee glares at him as he jostles Kahn around, a moronic smile across his face.

“I don't know why you're laughing, dummy. Trey also said this hole was owned by three of the most stupid sons of bitches he’d ever met, and what do you know, you must be the stupidest one,” Tanner sneers. “How are you so fucking idiotic?”

Mac's no longer smiling, his mouth a thin, angry line, eyes narrow. He tightens his grip on Kahn's arms, making him groan.

“Hey,” Dee says, seeing her chance to really twist the knife. “Maybe it's coz you're not jerking off over lent that you're making such dumb mistakes, Mac?”

Mac’s jaw falls open, and the three unrestrained boys start laughing uproariously.

“Oh my god! Gave up jacking it for lent!”

“That is too fucking much!”

“Must be why he’s enjoying holding Kahn so much!”

“Ha! Holy fuck, I bet he's got a boner right now!”

“Have you dumbass? Have you got a rager? Hey! Kahn! Can you feel something poking you?”

Kahn looks traumatized. “Jesus man, please don't get a boner, I mean it!” he shouts, his voice cracking.

“I'm not! I’m not!” Mac yells back, his grasp around the boy still firm, apparently unsure what else to do.

Dee smirks. “Don't wiggle around too much, Kahn, and you should be fine,” she says, looking straight at Mac. Asshat. Teach him to call Deandra Reynolds’ fashion sense into question.

“Now, are you boys gonna leave?” She asks Tanner, who’s definitely the leader of this little gang.

“Yes!” Kahn shrieks, and squirms in Mac’s grip until he meets Dee's gaze and stops, remembering her prior advice. “Please!”

Tanner, however, looks at her coolly. “What's it worth?” He says, lip-curled, arms folded across his chest.

“How about, if you _don't_ leave, I let my co-worker here take his frustrations out on you and your buddies?”

“No! Fuck, Pennington, let’s just go!” Kahn cries, trying to break free of Mac again to no avail.

“What?! Dee, what are you talking about?” Mac squawks. “I am _not_ your co-worker, I'm your boss, you uppity bitch!”

Dee grins. Mac hasn't even registered the other half of her sentence, and while he's distracted trying to keep the tiny Asian boy still, she points at the other three and mouths _he’s gonna_ _fuck you_. Her face is a mask of sadistic delight, and Tanner falters.

“You could take _all_ these little boys, couldn't you Mac?” She says, as he continues struggling to incapacitate even one of them, Kahn apparently having decided he’s going to wriggle his way out of Mac's clutches, boner or not.

“Oh yeah" Mac answers, breathless from the ongoing struggle. “I could very easily.. wait... immobilise... shit!... these kids... you little... and pound the shit out of them.. stop it you little fuck!” Kahn is trying, without much success, to twist his head round so he can bite Mac, and while its  not totally effective, it appears to be disruptive enough to be causing Mac some difficulties.

“Screw this, dude, I'm leaving,” Bianchi says, looking equal parts disturbed and disgusted. “It smells like unwashed gym kit in here anyway.” He gets down from the stool and deposits his beer bottle on the pool table.

“Yeah, c'mon Penn,” Nameless Guy says, dropping his pool cue. “This is bullshit. I’d rather be in class than this shithole.”

“Yeah, c'mon _Penn_ ,” Dee jeers. “Time to hit the road you little jizz-sock.”

“Oh my God! He _has_ got a hard-on! Fuck!” Kahn squeals suddenly, and, apparently having received an unexpected jolt of fear-based strength, finally gets free of Mac’s arms and sprints out the rear door.

Tanner watches him go, and balls his fists up by his sides. “Yeah, I’ll leave, but you haven't heard the last of me. My dad owns half this city, and he will fucking crush-"

“Yeah yeah, big man, crush crush crush. Save it for your therapist, Penny.” Dee says, shooing all three boys towards the same exit through which their friend just bolted.

“You’re disgusting, Dee" Tanner's ranting as he exits, close on the heels of his buddies. “That’s what the Dee is for, right? Dirty Disgusting Dickhead Dee. And you,” he exclaims, looking at Mac, “are a fucking pervert! You’re fucking sick, you know that?”

“Whatever" Dee says, and gives him one final push out the door, before banging it shut and sliding the latch across.

When she turns back round to Mac, he's stood, shell-shocked, by the pool table, hands awkward in front of himself, and face flushed.

“I... I didn't mean to, he was... It was the friction,” he stammers.

“Oh my God. You didn't _actually_ get a chub on?!” Dee crows gleefully.

“It was the friction!”

“Holy shit Mac, that's a new low even for you. Was it me talking about you fucking them that did it? Lovely little gang bang?” Dee leans on the pool table, chin in her hands, and pretends to be enthralled. “Hey, I get it! They were cute. And you know what they say, if there's grass on the field, play ball! I don't actually know if there _was_ grass-"

“I swear to God.” Mac growls, his tone gone from shame to anger in an instant. “I am on the edge, Dee. I am on the goddamn edge.”

“Uh-oh! Better not upset Mr. Cranky Pants. 'Specially when he's all horned up with nowhere to go!”

Dee actually thinks she sees the switch flick. One minute, Mac’s stood there looking like a big, sad cow, all pouty and doe-eyed, the next he's snapped a pool cue over his knee and is smashing it against the wall, striking the photo frames and signs and various bits of Ireland-themed crap that hang there, shards of broken glass raining down onto the grubby floor like deadly confetti, the air filled with the nonsensical bellows of a man having some sort of mental break.

Dee grinds her molars together. She's gonna have to clear this shit up, she can tell.

Then it’s over, as quickly as it began.

Mac carefully places the half of the cue he’s been brandishing back in the rack.

“I’m leaving now, Dee, and I might not be back for some time,” he says, his voice low and even. He walks past her, glass cracking like bones under his feet. Dee hears the latch click and the noise of the street outside, and it's quiet again. 

She exhales, surveying the damage. Great.

Just then, the office door opens.

“What in God's name is going on out here?” Dennis asks irritably. “I was sleeping!”

“Mac had a freak out.” Dee gestures at the mess to illustrate her point.

“Huh. Oh yeah. Well get that cleaned up, yeah? Don't want someone slicing themselves open and trying to sue us or some shit.” He looks down the bar and raises a hand in greeting. “Ah didn't see you there, Joey, she'll be with you in a minute.”

Dee turns to see one of the bar flies waiting at the other end of the counter, holding his empty glass.

“Hey" Dennis says, nodding towards the patron. “Don’t neglect the customers. You’re a barmaid, remember?” He winks, and retreats back to the office.

Dee closes her eyes.

“God damn it.”

***

“How did that not wake you up before, man? This place was a mess,” Charlie says, looking almost impressed. “Catfood and beer, right? S'gotta be.”

“Catfood and beer? No.” Dennis frowns. “No! Don’t be ridiculous. I was just hungover as shit is all. I can't believe you almost fell for another teen-aged boy, Dee. How many is that now? Three?”

“That we know of," Frank adds, looking concerned.

“What?! That’s what you're taking from this?! Mac let four _very_ underage boys with some of the worst fake ID's I've ever seen drink in the bar! And when _I_ tried to kick them out, he rubbed his goddamn boner on one of them!”

“Yeah, and you almost banged one of ‘em, so you're not exactly covering yourself in glory here either, Deandra," Dennis notes, brows raised.

Dee makes an exasperated noise. “Dennis. You could. Have gone. To jail. Do you understand me?”

Dennis screws up his face. “Nahhh, I dunno Dee, I’m pretty sure you would have gone to jail, but I wasn’t even involved. Why would I go to jail? Go to jail for having a sleep in the office? I don’t think so.”

“You are impossible!” Dee shrieks, and Dennis shrugs. “Why am I even surprised,” she continues. “You’re awful. You are the worst! You haven’t even asked where Mac went!”

Dennis holds his hands up. “Why would I care?” he says, bewildered. “He’s a big boy, I’m sure he can look after himself.”

“Did you even consider, Dennis, that he might have gone to, like, do something to himself?” Dee suggests.

“What, like jack off? I mean, if he has, that’s a shame coz he was doing so well, but ultimately-“ Dennis begins to answer before Dee cuts him off.

“No, not like jack off, like kill himself! From the embarrassment! He said ‘I’m leaving now and I might not be back,’” she points out.

Dennis makes a noise of derision and shakes his head. Even Frank and Charlie look dubious.

“I can’t really see it, the guy’s not exactly a stranger to humiliation y’know?” Charlie says, and Frank nods.

“Exactly, Charlie, you’re 100% correct. I would even hazard to say that Mac inadvertently rubbing his erect penis against a teenage boy is one of the less embarrassing things he’s done,” Dennis expounds.

“I guess…” Dee says. “But you have to admit, he's been really weird lately. And _so_ annoying.”

Charlie and Frank make murmurs of agreement.

“So annoying" Frank repeats.

“And mean! Just really, really mean!” Charlie adds.

“There must be something about slapping your meat that just keeps you guys' brains in check,” Dee comments offhandedly.

“Of course there is!” Charlie exclaims.

“Not doin’ it ain't natural,” Frank chimes in. “That's biology 101.”

“Absolutely, Frank,” Dennis concurs. “Yes. We can all agree that masturbation, for a man, is very normal and necessary and the lack of it may be, _possibly_ , the reason Mac has been something of a loose cannon of late.”

Dee pulls a face. “Wait a minute, what do you mean ‘for a man'? Women masturbate too, you know, in fact-“

“Dee! We are not having this conversation again! I don't want to hear about women doing that shit. It's not cute, and I'm sick of you pushing this women's lib ‘I don't need a man to get my kicks’ stuff. It's all just another ploy by the females to make men feel surplus to requirement, and I’m not buying it! If dick’s so bad, then why are dildos so popular, huh?” Dennis rants. “They're just plastic dicks! So riddle me that one, Ruth Bader Gins-bird!”

Frank laughs, and Dee shoots him a dirty look.

“Just, everyone, leave Mac alone,” Dennis carries on, a bit more calmly. “He's made some mistakes, he's preoccupied with all sorts of stupid shit, and he's got the temper of a toddler. But he's also one of your oldest and – Well, obviously not _dearest_ , but certainly most available, friends, and surely we can cut him a bit of slack and just let him carry on with this ridiculous attempt to make up for a lifetime of sin by not knocking one out for forty days?”

He stops, and scans the faces of the three people in front of him. Dee looks like an angry bulldog, arms folded and fingers drumming out an impatient rhythm on her bicep, while Frank stares blankly at him, and Charlie picks at his thumbnail despondently. It would appear Dennis isn’t exactly winning hearts and minds right now.

The moment’s suddenly interrupted by a commotion in the bar, the sound of the front door crashing open and drawers being pulled out and slammed shut again, items being rifled through and thrown aside manically. Dennis, Dee, Frank and Charlie look at each other, worried. Frank reaches in his pocket for his revolver.

“Mac?” Dennis calls out, warily. It's either Mac, or they're getting robbed again.

“Guys! Guys! Oh shit,” comes the panicked reply, and all four of them breathe a sigh of relief. Frank goes to return his gun to his pocket.

“I've had an accident, I've done something terrible!” The disembodied voice shouts.

“What's that little pissant done now,” Frank grumbles, and removes his gun once more, clicking the safety off.

Dennis frowns. “Frank, put your gun away, Jesus Christ. Mac! We're in here man.”

Mac appears at the office door, leaning dramatically on the frame.

“Holy shit" Dee says, “what in God's name happened to you?”

Mac looks like he's gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson. There’s blood running from his nose over his top lip and a bright red-dy purple bruise is already blooming under his eyes.

“I did something terrible" he says hoarsely, and coughs, wincing in pain. “I'm so sorry, Dennis. I didn't mean to...” He coughs again, massive hacking convulsions causing him to bend over double, hands on his knees.

Dee, Charlie and Frank all turn to Dennis, still sat behind the desk, barely able to contain their excitement. He narrows his eyes at them. They're like goddamn vultures, waiting for him to dispense the first strike so they can all pile on afterward.

“It’s ok buddy,” Dennis says in his most kindly tone when Mac finally stops attempting to expel a lung, and is back to leaning on the doorframe, trying to catch his breath. Dennis has got to take the high road here, lest he be seen as a hypocrite. It can't be that bad. Mac probably mixed a red sock in with the whites and turned some of his shirts pink, or broke a glass or something back at the apartment. Mac has always had a flair for the dramatic. “You're my _friend,_ ” he adds, looking pointedly at the other three. “We can sort it out. What happened?”

Mac looks apprehensive, but begins: “Well, so, I had to go out earlier because _Dee”_ he jabs a finger in her direction,  “got me wound up, I got all hot and sort of took a pool cue to the back wall. But to be fair, guys, it was her fault because she goaded me. It really couldn't be helped given the circumstances.”

Dee grimaces.  “What a pile of horseshit! You were the one going all _To Catch A Predator_ on those kids!”

Dennis raises his hand towards Dee. “Deandra, stop your honking, or so help me God! And Mac, your nose is bleeding all over your face and going in your mouth and it’s making me sick. Jesus, put your head back before I puke, seriously.”

“Oh, sure, sorry Dennis,” Mac says, and tips his head so he’s looking at the ceiling.

“Pinch your nose,” Charlie butts in. “It’ll keep the blood in your face, where it should be.”

Mac gives Charlie a thumbs up and pinches his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “As I was saying,” he says, his voice muffled and nasal, “I got hot and I was ready to start tearing assholes in two-"

“Always with the gay stuff,” Frank mumbles.

“Not like that!” Mac says, waving his non-pinching hand dismissively. “I was real pissed off, so I went outside for a walk, you know, clear my head. So I was walking around, bam bam bam, starting to feel a bit better, and I got back to the bar and there was the Range Rover-”

Dennis visibly bristles. He doesn't like the sound of where this is going.

“- And Den says that being busy is good for... for, er, keeping me on the straight and narrow.... and one of the things he suggested was cleaning the car -"

Dee spins round to look at Dennis, eyes flashing. Dennis rolls his eyes in response and puts his index finger to his lips while Mac continues.

“- So coz I was still feeling a bit, y'know, erm, I dunno, antsy or whatever, I thought I'd clean the Range Rover interior.”

He pauses, before coughing again.

“And? What happened then, Mac? Just fucking... _tell the story_ , ok? Pal?” Dennis commands through gritted teeth, still trying his damnedest to keep his demeanor as light and friendly as possible.

“So I cleaned all the interior, it's looking real good Dennis, I cleared out all the broken zip ties from the glove box and wound up all your rope nice and neat, and emptied the ashtrays and I even got the little battery vacuum and did the mats in the footwells –“

“Just spit it out! Fuck!” Dennis shouts. He’s getting beyond irritated now. He can see the red mist descending.

“Sorry, gah, erm well, then, I know how you like it when I warm the car up for you, and it's been chilly today, hasn't it? It's been chilly today. So I hot wired it, eventually, when I remembered it was red wire to red wire. Never can remember that.  And I was turning the engine over, y'know, and erm I got distracted by... something, and I accidentally put the car in reverse and I....I -" Mac pauses, struggling to get the words out.

“Say it! Say it, goddamn it!” Dennis roars, succumbing to the horrible, sickening suspense of wanting, no, _needing_ to know what Mac's done.

“Ok! Ok! I backed the Range Rover into a stop sign! The airbag deployed in my face, and I think it had poison in it or something coz it went in my throat, and it fucking _burns_! And I smashed the rear tail light, it’s all over the street outside... I'm sorry, Dennis! You can’t see, coz I’m looking at the ceiling, but I’m honestly really broken up about the whole thing.”

Dennis is silent, seemingly processing the information, and Dee seizes the opportunity to hammer home her earlier point.

“And what were you distracted by, huh, Mac?” She asks, innocently.

“Erm it was... um. A jogger,” Mac admits. “In my defense though, he was wearing these teeny tiny little shorts, they were _so_ small!”

Dee gives Dennis an ‘I told you so' look just as Mac's lungs give in and he does an explosive cough, blood spraying across the office and splattering Charlie and Frank and the back of Dee’s head.

All three of them start yelling immediately.

“Jesus Christ, it went in my goddamn mouth!”

“It’s in my hair! I only got it done last week you idiot! That's disgusting!”

“Oh man that is really gross, I told you to hold your nose, now you’ve got blood outside of your body and that's not good for you dude!”

Mac carries on coughing: eyes streaming, blood still glistening over his lip - his whole face is a bloody, pulpy mess and his head is pounding, and Dee, Frank and Charlie are screaming at him. Dennis allows it to continue for a few minutes. Mac deserves it, the moron. He has no idea how hard it is to get replacement parts for a car that was made in 1993! How can he have done this to him? Breaking audition tapes, kissing people without permission, smashing the bar up… those were mild inconveniences. You don’t fuck with a man’s vehicle!

Dennis slams his fist on the table three times in quick succession and everyone shuts up. Even Mac’s hacking stops.

“Charlie, go and help Mac sort his mangled face out before he ejaculates blood over everyone again,” Dennis says quietly, and that’s when Mac can tell he’s really messed up, coz Den doesn't sound angry, he just sounds disappointed.

“Dennis, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to do it, it just happened!” he protests, as Charlie pushes him out the doorway.

“Come on man, let’s get the first aid kit,” Charlie’s saying as he guides Mac away, a dead man walking.

“First aid kit? I didn’t know we had a first aid kit,” Dee comments.

“It’s just an old cereal box fulla dirty socks that Charlie uses to plug up wounds,” Frank replies. “Got the idea from Mac actually, I had a botched toe –“

Dennis cuts in, practically quivering with rage. “Stop.”

Frank does, and he and Dee both look expectantly at the clearly furious man behind the desk, sitting rigid with anger, hands shaking as he runs them over his face and rubs at his eyes as if he might wake from this nightmare.

When he speaks again, his voice is ice cold. “This Mac thing is a real issue. He’s a liability, and an emotional goddamn wreck. His negligence towards my vehicle is a huge problem, and I won’t sit idly by while you let this continue.”

“Are you kidding me?” Frank says.

“No, I’m not kidding you! We need this to stop, right now!”

Dee shakes her head in disbelief. “But… but we _were_ trying to stop…”

“Enough!” Dennis explodes. “I don’t care if you disagree, I won’t hear another word on the matter! Mac needs to start jerking off again, and that’s final! This conversation is over. Now go, I need to think.”

Frank and Dee head out the office, muttering between themselves. Dennis takes out a sheet of paper, picks up the pre-chewed pen and scrawls across the head of the page ‘ _The RONALD System’._

Down the left of the page he writes Ronald vertically, before filling in each letter, so it reads as follows:

_Reject Jesus_

_Objectify beefcakes_

_Nurture obsession_

_Advocate homosexuality_

_Liberate nut_

_Deliver normality_

 

Yes, things would be back to usual in no time. No time at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I apologise for being slow every single chapter I post, but this one did take ages and it's not even very interesting. Basically I had a load of stuff to do for work and so I had to act like a normal, functioning member of society for a few weeks.
> 
> Comments are always appreciated. I don't really go on tumblr so much any more but if you'd like to get in touch please do as I'm always looking for new friends or people to tell me why my writing is dogshit.
> 
> @brownwithafrown

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr: brownwithafrown. Say hi, it'll make my day.#
> 
> #getmaclaid2k19


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